


from the dark with you above

by cairophoenix



Category: Lizzie Bennet Diaries
Genre: Alcohol, F/F, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Mutual Pining, Pining, Post-Canon, Slow Build, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-16
Updated: 2015-07-16
Packaged: 2018-04-09 16:03:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4355402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cairophoenix/pseuds/cairophoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But here she is, standing in front of a popcorn counter at a second-rate movie theater in clothes two notches too nice to be casual, and she’s offering Lydia a smile just as bright as that time in the grocery store, just as bright as she smiles at Lizzie. So Lydia checks the instinct to perform, brings it down a few watts to something a little more real, and says, “Gigi!”</p>
            </blockquote>





	from the dark with you above

There’s an art to running into people. For a long time, Lydia thought that everyone else was really bad at it, but recently she’s become pretty sure that they just aren’t trying. Lydia is better at it than anyone else she knows—she’s found that social media is a gift. So are bars, and malls, and wearing a bright enough shade of pink that people will spot her from halfway down the block. There’s a little thrill of joy every time that sends goosebumps up her arms, and not just because whomever she’s trying to run into is usually pretty cute. She loves being noticed.

There’s an art to running into people, and probably an art to avoiding them, but Lydia can’t scrub a pink sweater into grey by clenching her fists. She can’t be anywhere other than here, can’t not be standing next to Lizzie. She’s spent her whole life in-your-face ignoring people she doesn’t want to see, and yet here they are in the middle of a grocery store and _she is not ready to talk to Gigi Darcy yet._ If Gigi is here, now, and she is—Lydia just can’t be.

She turns up the corners of her mouth into a smile that she knows (but doesn’t particularly care) looks unpleasant and forced, throws the word “bathroom” somewhere in Lizzie’s general direction, and leaves. Lydia stands next to the sodas in the back of the store and reads listicles on her phone until Lizzie texts her—“Lyd? What’s the matter?”

Gigi got Darcy to take the site down. She had told Lydia. She’d sent her a message, explained things. Lydia had watched the Domino videos, one by one, deliberately, and never replied. She doesn’t know what to say to this girl. She doesn’t know how to talk to this girl, all awkward empathy and trying too hard. She barely knows how to talk to Darcy, whom she mostly just treats as she used to but maybe with more softness at the edges. Darcy’s an asshole with a heart of gold and she’s trying to understand him for Lizzie’s sake.

Lydia does not have to talk to Gigi.

She stands by the sodas and, almost impulsively, pulls up the Domino test videos on YouTube. When Lizzie walks up, she still hasn’t pressed play. Lydia doesn’t even need to look for the concern on her sister’s face, just gives her best _what?_ shrug, grabs her hand, and pulls her towards the Redbox. She’s only visiting Lizzie for a week while her parents deal with the details of moving out of their house and into the new “almost-empty-nesters, we’re-downsizing” apartment, and they have some serious movies to catch up on.

 

** 

Lydia’s supposed to be putting up the Christmas lights, but so far there's a massive tangle of them still sitting in the box and none at all on the tree. She’s doing the important first step of any project—looking angry and cute so that it will do itself, or so that someone else will offer to take a turn. The tree is real and smells like Christmas, and it’s _huge_ , stretching to the roof of Darcy’s San Francisco apartment that he and Lizzie are doing a poor job of pretending that they aren’t sharing now.

They’re cuddled over on the couch somewhere, and the _disgustingly in love_ banner that practically hovers over them like, always, is still flying strong. Lydia ignores the worried twinge in her stomach—gentler, now, than it was months ago—and instead elects to roll her eyes forcefully at them. They don’t notice, of course, but that’s part of the point. Jane does, but that’s part of the point too, how many times can she get away with this before Jane sits her down for her version of a lecture? She’s pretty sure she’ll get there by New Year’s, at this point.

Jane gives her a smile and a look, but she thinks she hears a bit of a snort from someone else too. Gigi turns her head quickly when Lydia looks at her. She’s sitting on the couch picking through ornaments. She and Lydia have been avoiding eye contact all day. Lydia feels bad, a bit, for the grocery store; she didn’t mean to make her think—she doesn’t _hate_ the girl, she just doesn’t want to know her. So she isn’t sure, really, why she smiles.

Later, after the lights are up and the tree is decorated, Lydia steels herself and flops down on the couch beside Gigi. She doesn’t say anything, but they both pick the hazelnuts out of the bowl of mixed nuts on the coffee table and laugh at the same parts of the dumb movie, and when Lydia gets up for eggnog, she comes back with two glasses. It’s a little bit of an apology, she thinks.

 

** 

The Bennets drive home right after Christmas. Lydia’s gotten trapped into a double shift at the theater and her poorly-scheduled last therapy appointment, and Dad wants to set up his new trains. She doesn’t really mind about missing New Years at the Darcys’. She got a bunch of new clothes for her birthday, including one top she _really_ wants to wear to Carter’s, and Jane and Bing are coming back home with them and they said they’d go with her. There’s a boy she knows will be there, and she’s trying to get her flirt game back on. And if she sticks to her work schedule and doesn’t try to move stuff around, she’ll make a lot of money to put towards college and moving to San Fran. And she’ll get to be home on New Year’s Eve.

So she goes to her shifts, and while she doesn’t exactly make bank, she thinks it’s an okay call. She goes to Carter’s, too, and it’s fine. It’s almost too easy to guess the night the boy will be there. He’s predictable and cute and utterly bland, and they’re laughing in the corner with her fingers curled around his bicep by 11:30. When Lydia leans against him, she glances at the other side of the bar where Bing is tipsy at the Whack-A-Mole. Jane is watching her, not pretending that she’s not. She tips her head and widens her eyes a little. Lydia turns around and kisses the boy, hard, wrapping her hand further around his sculpted arm and reaching up for his hair with the other. Even though she’s had half a bottle of bubbly wine, she doesn’t tingle at all, and she wonders through thirty seconds of mouth whether it’s his boring jokes and boring smile or whether George is blocking her in some weird lasting way.

When she surfaces and looks over her shoulder, Jane gives her a smile that’s somewhere between understanding and sad, so Lydia kisses the boy again. He smiles at her when they pull away, so she leaves to go play Whack-A-Mole. Bing throws his arm around her and offers her the mallet. She outscores him by a mile.

 

**

It’s February and it’s cold, and it is six minutes before the end of Lydia’s shift. While she started the night fully intending to go out after work, that’s changed somewhere between the kids’ birthday party and the ICEE machine breaking. All in all the idea of her bed and her cat and a lot of Netflix has begun to sound less lame and more, hello, yes. She is flicking through the queue on her phone’s Netflix app and when she hears the jingle of the door.

She and the high school kid working the other side of the counter have a five-second silent gestured battle, but the dried ICEE blue all over her uniform apron says that it’s his turn to handle this one and she is not going to back down. He drops his hands, conceding, and she makes herself busy by doing something complicated-looking with the butter machine and tuning out the rest of the ticket purchase.

But then customers sidle into her peripheral vision—of course they wanted the damn popcorn—and so Lydia pastes on her customer-service-happy face and turns to help them.

Two girls look at her across the counter. “A large, please,” one of them repeats. Lydia thinks she can hear the edge of annoyance shoved down under a smile.

Lydia nods at her and goes to grabs the bucket. “Just the one?”

The shorter girl looks up from her phone, then drops her friend’s hand to give a sort of half-wave that makes Lydia check behind her to see who it’s for. “Hey, Lydia.”

Lydia almost drops the popcorn bucket, because Gigi Darcy is the last person she was expecting to see here. Twitter put her in San Francisco last Lydia checked, and she hasn’t been tagged in anything on Facebook for weeks. Her mind goes to the half-email sitting in her drafts—three false starts, a simple “yo thanks,” and a couple conversation-starter links. Is this the universe trying to tell her to get over herself already?

Either way, here Gigi is, standing in front of a popcorn counter at a second-rate movie theater in clothes two notches too nice to be casual, and she’s offering Lydia a smile just as bright as that time in the grocery store, just as bright as she smiles at Lizzie. So Lydia checks the instinct to perform, brings it down a few watts to something a little more real and says, “Gigi!”

She is grasping for another sentence, something that sounds a little less abrupt than _what are you doing here_ , but Gigi takes over, her words tripping over each other. Lydia has the impression that she’s relieved. “It’s _too_ crazy to run into you, I somehow just didn’t realize, or, I guess, I forgot you’d be in town when Lizzie isn’t, or I didn’t think about it, but _too_ crazy, right? You work here?” 

“For now. Totes not my scene, but I’m waiting on some transfer applications, you know, and,” Lydia lowers her voice, “The manager’s way hot, so like, could be worse, but yeah, filling popcorn buckets.”

Gigi raises an eyebrow at Scott, who has spread calculus homework all over the glass ticket counter, and Lydia mimes horror. “God, no, you’d think that of me? We’re talking six-three bodybuilder-type, smoulder, totally within earshot in the office right now.” She winks exaggeratedly at the clearly-empty manager’s booth, and Gigi looks confused. “I’m kidding. He’s like, sixty-eight. I’m pretty sure this place is his retirement project. Filling popcorn buckets with Scotty-o here is the top of the job.”

“Does he still have the abs, though?”

Lydia lets out a laugh, and she knows it’s a little too loud and a little too long and absolutely betrays her shock at the joke, but she is somehow relieved that Gigi is not Well-Intentioned Robot Darce #2. Gigi looks taken aback, but happy.

Her friend does not. “Can we go? Movie’s starting,” she says, “and just because you’re paying, Gigi Darcy, does not mean that I don’t want to catch the beginning.” Her voice has joking lilt up at the end that makes Gigi give her a bit of a look and Lydia give the whole situation another once-over. Ah.

“Hey, yeah, you should go,” she says, back to movie-theater professional, because the squeal she wants to emit seems too potentially misplaced for a person that she’s only just on speaking terms with. She grabs a bucket and scoops in the popcorn. “Enjoy the movie,” she adds, and then, because it’s inevitable since their siblings have locked them into orbit, “See you around.”

 

** 

She wasn’t expecting to have her parting remarks come true quite so soon.

Lydia is wiping down the counters. The afternoon feature doesn’t start for thirty minutes, and the glass was smudgy and since she’s here maybe all year she might as well do a good job. She’s focused on the glass, really trying to get it clean, and her music is blaring loud with one earbud and the other against her chest, so it takes her a minute to hear the throat-clearing. She looks up. Gigi is hanging back more than last week, and she’s alone. “Hey,” she says.

“Gigi, hi,” Lydia says, a little more cautiously than before. The weird energy of their first interaction is gone, and Lydia realizes that this is maybe the first time they’re actually talking. Lydia knows she can’t know someone before she knows them, but she’s watched Gigi’s Domino videos again, finally. She doesn’t think Gigi was acting. She looks at her, Gigi’s hair curling in waves around her face and her mouth turned halfway up. An eyebrow quirks. Lydia sees her notice her consideration and breaks the eye contact, shakes her head a little and goes to grab the popcorn bucket. “How’s my sister?”

“Honestly?” Gigi smirks a little. “Totally gross, it’s like they orbit around each other.” Her voice is warm, though. Lydia digs through the weird decorative stale corn for the scoop.

“Surprise,” she says, pleased at how little cynicism and how much normalcy she manages to inject into the statement. “How’s the apartment? I’ve been meaning to get out there since Lizzie moved—I mean. Officially. You know. But we’re all a little broke right now.”

Gigi nods, serious. “Are you saving up?” Lydia scrunches her eyebrows, tilts her head. “To visit, I mean? Because I bet they’ll be visiting me at Netherfield eventually, and as _so_ gorgeous as the new apartment is, I mean, here is nice. It’s calmer.” Lydia has the sense she’s been practicing, avoiding repeats of _where do you ski_.

“Wait, that reminds me,” Lydia says, “Besides, like, okay, Netherfield is totes amazing, but why are you here?”

Gigi sort of shrugs. “Gap time before grad school. I can do my graphic design stuff for Pemberley from a distance, and I needed to get away for a while. Plus I would’ve had to find a new apartment anyway if I stayed, and that’s a pain, so here I am.”

“Well, you’re definitely _away._ Have you even been here before? I mean, maybe you have, I guess,” she amends quickly, “but it’s sort of just a town. Like, there’s Carter’s, but that’s about it and it’s more fun with friends, so with Lizzie and Jane away pretty much I’m saving for college actually. Somewhere else.”

“I hear NYU is nice,” offers Gigi.

“Probably,” Lydia says, “but far.” She holds out the bucket of popcorn.

 Gigi smiles and her and takes the bucket. "Thanks, Lydia." There's a moment of awkward pause. Gigi shifts her weight a little and then says, "Anyway, it was nice to see you!"

"See you, " Lydia says. Moments after Gigi steps away, Lydia realizes Gigi has left her ticket and change on the counter. "Wait, don't forget your—" Gigi turns back around. "You’re probs gonna want this.” And then because she can't resist now that there's an in, she adds, "Speaking of forgetting, someone's missing. Where’s your date today?

She's pretty sure she's spot-on, because Gigi turns pink. "I, uh, she's not—I, I mean she _was_ but not anym—um, I'm here, um, on my own today."

“Calm down, I was kidding,” Lydia says. She's privately delighted. She's also extremely curious, but she can pump Lizzie for information later, so she suppresses the urge to push. "Solo moviegoer to theater four." 

"Thanks," Gigi says. The blush fades from her cheeks and she smiles. "Anyway, this is absolutely going to sound like a lie, but I wanted to see this one alone. It looks like too much of a tearjerker to see with someone, you know?"

Before she started working at the theater, Lydia doesn't think she'd ever gone to see a movie alone. And she's been avoiding sad movies. She's seen enough bits of this one during work to maybe know what Gigi means, though, so she says, "Actually, yeah. Yeah, def."

 Gigi gives her a smile that looks a little grateful and she scoops up her change from the counter. "Okay, so unless I've forgotten something else. See you!"

 

**

After the fifth buzz, she sneak-checks her phone under the dinner table. Mary never texts that many times in a row. 

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:27:56: OMG, you have Domino? So glad :)

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:29:03: Look, I know this is weird, and I’m sorry, but could you… not tell my brother about that girl from the other day?

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:30:05: It’s not worth the conversation. It was only like four dates and it's definitely over now so

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:30:59: Like he’ll get all pedantic, and, I mean, like Lizzie’s the greatest ever but I _know_ you know what I mean. Right?

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:33:01: I’m sorry. I know this is weird.

It buzzes again in her hand:

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 19:33:25: Younger sisters have to stick together, right?

She thumbs in a, “Sry, dinner, ill get back to you” and begrudgingly shoves the thing back into her pocket so that her mom can keep setting her up with the bright young man her father met at the model train store today. “I don’t know him, Mom, who even is he?”

“Well I’m sure _I_ don’t know, ask your father, dear, but he can’t be any worse than that _last_ fellow.”

Lydia’s dad meets her eyes across the table and nods at her. She leaves her plate at the table and heads for her room. In truth, she thinks she doesn’t need this escape route anymore, but she can’t help taking a little bit of advantage.

She flops onto her bed and stares at the screen for a while, one arm trailing down to the floor. From two feet away the letters of Gigi’s texts are small.

With one finger, she taps in, “Why?”

Gigi: “What?”

Lydia: “Why. Why are you being so nice to me?”

Gigi: “Why wouldn’t I?”

Lydia: “I never replied.”

Lydia: “And I guess I should have.”

She types the next words, looks at them. She doesn’t know whether this is right, and there are too many lines in her text box and none of them say quite what she wants them to. But it’s time, she thinks.

Lydia: “It’s hard to figure out how to say thank you to someone who you’re pretty sure will get exactly what you mean. Because from everyone else it’s pity. And I don’t think it’s pity from you. I don’t need it and I don’t know if I deserve it but I don’t think it’s pity from you? So thanks? For that. And for. You know. Thanks. They were weird videos for an app test, btdubs. Thanks.”

It takes ten minutes for the reply to come.

“I’m glad.” And then: “They do show off the app, anyway.”

And then: “And—because my brother is sleeping with your sister, and it’s totally gross but they're also totally adorable and I want someone to talk to about them.”

Another minute goes by.

“And because I’m here for a few months and honestly I think I need more people to talk to.”

Another minute: “If you don’t want to be friends, though, I understand.”

Lydia picks up the phone from where she had tossed it, upside-down against a pillow at the edge of the bed, and types a reply. “Want to get coffee on Wednesday?”

 

**

Gigi puts an inordinate amount of sugar in her coffee.

“I thought you were supposed to be a health nut,” Lydia throws across the table as Gigi tears open her third packet of sugar. “Kale on kale and all that?”

The corners of Gigi’s mouth turn up as she goes for the creamer. “I… don’t know if I’d put it like that, but what’s the point of coffee if you’re only putting in fake sugar and fake creamer?”

Lydia reconsiders the three Splendas she is holding, then reaches for the brown packets of raw. She tastes it and gasps dramatically. “Oh, you are _right,_ what have I been _doing?_ ” She empties a fourth packet in, and Gigi giggles. All of a sudden the version of herself that Lydia’s managing to play-act back into seems too loud, too _energetic_ , and she crumples her napkin under the table.

Gigi smiles, though. “Are you trying to poison yourself?

Lydia loosens her grip on the napkin. She sips mock-primly. “The Ly-di-a knows what she likes, thank you.”

“Right.” Gigi flicks the empty packet across the table and Lydia squeals. She deleted the draft emails last night. She deleted some older emails as well, some Facebook messages, some texts off her phone. Something has unclenched within her, a little.

“So why are you working, right now? You said—”

Lydia feels herself draw back inwards, instinctively. She knows it isn’t meant to be a money thing, not a condemnation, but. “It doesn’t matter.”

“No, really, I want to know.” Then immediately, “I mean, not if you don’t want to tell me. I mean, not that you have to have a reason. That’s, uh—have you seen the new Spiderman? Lizzie and I went to see it last week, and—”

“I only work at a movie theater,” says Lydia. She knows the tightness in her voice is misplaced, but she cannot shake it any more than she can convince herself that she is not watching the stupid snub point of Gigi’s nose as she twists her coffee stirrer. She weighs the resentment on a balance against the anxiety in Gigi’s eyes and manages to lighten her tone. “I’ve seen everything. Actually, everything’s a lie. I haven’t seen it yet.”

“You’re kidding,” Gigi says, and her eyes have switched to an earnest reproach. They are very grey and very sharp and very deep.

Lydia feels something within her unclench just a little bit. “No, I just haven’t gotten around to it. Did Lizzie go see it, really?”

“Yeah, I totally dragged her though. She wouldn’t stop talking about remakes and their potential in web video.”

Her chest eases just a little more, and she moves her mouth into something like a smile at her sugar-coffee. Gigi takes a sip of her own.

It’s very quiet, suddenly. “So.”

“So?”

They both know, suddenly, where this conversation is going.

“Who was the date?”

“Oh. Oh.”

Lydia puts her hands on her hips and forms the start of a pout. “Going to tell?”

Gigi is looking back and forth like maybe there’s an escape route, but Lydia is feeling very in her groove and she is very curious and she is going to find out what the story is. She leans forward a little and grins and cocks an eyebrow.

“She’s,” Gigi starts, then hides her face for a moment, “A mistake, mostly.”

Lydia catches the next question she has floating on her lips, traps it behind them. She still doesn’t really know Gigi, and if she ever wants to—since when does she want to?—she needs to let the next words come out on their own.

Gigi takes a few breaths, and she seems to have gained some confidence because her next words come out brazen. “Like I said, I’ve been lonely, and I’m here until grad school applications come back, and there’s a-a dumb crush I was trying to get over, and Pemberley Digital is trying out a new dating app, and I-I—”

“Can’t say much for taste,” Lydia says before she can stop herself. Gigi stutters, swallows, and lets out the rest of her sentence in a rush of air, and Lydia is confused for half a beat before she realizes what—who—Gigi heard in her words. Fuck. This wasn’t deliberate, it just—no. It wasn’t on purpose. He’s just there.

Lydia’s interjection hangs in the air between them. She wants to leave, to run down the hall to her room like she would at home, but this isn’t her apartment. So she lets her words stay there, stares them down. Gigi looks back at her through the shards of the comment and says, a little slowly, “No.” Then she smiles, suddenly. “No. Can’t say much for taste.”

The shards are gone and the air is clean and Lydia is so happy, so relieved, that she leans across the table and grabs Gigi’s hand. “Come on,” she says. “Let’s go do something fun.”

 

**

There aren’t a lot of options around for “something fun,” though, especially in the middle of the day on a Wednesday, so the two of them end up sitting in the living room of the Bennet apartment. They’re paging through some old baby albums while Friends streams in the background and the cat steps into their bowl of pretzels. The laugh track spills out across the room in bursts over Lydia and Gigi’s giggling. They sit on the floor, leaning against the worn-out leather couch. The albums are stacked on the coffee table and three or four lay open on the floor around them as they flip through the pages intermittently. They’ve bypassed the Jane years, gone straight to Lizzie with her baby fauxhawk and floral jumpsuits.

“She _hates_ this photo,” Lydia says, leaning across Gigi to point at photo in one of the albums open there. Baby Lizzie, face and hair smeared with infant food, eyes very wide and looking intently at her spoon, sits in a high chair next to a very young Jane, who appears to be focusing very hard on her own napkin. “She thinks it’s too _baby_ or something, I have no idea, but it’s hilarious. I posted it on Facebook one time and I thought she was going to have a heart attack.”

Gigi already has her phone out. “I’m sending it to William. No, wait, I’m sending it to Lizzie _and_ William. That way I get to see how she reacts.”

“And me,” Lydia suggests. “Wait, do you have any of your brother?”

“Yeah, yes,” says Gigi, clearly not paying attention as she swipes around on her phone, and then she snaps her head up. “Wait, _yes!_ Sorry, yes, I definitely do, they’re all on the Cloud—”

“ _Yes_ , hollaaaaa!” Lydia crows. She leans forward and pauses the episode playing on her laptop, slides it towards Gigi. “I want to see, let’s send them both the worst of each, it’ll be totes hilarious.” Gigi has already pulled the laptop towards her, grinning widely.

“Oh my god, I can’t believe I never thought of this one,” she says, and then, “Here! Yes!” It is a toddling Darcy, a very serious expression on his face, holding himself up by one hand which clings to that of a tall man Lydia assumes must be his father. In the other hand dragging him down is a very large teddy bear. Both Darcy and the bear are wearing bow ties.

Lydia laughs loudly. “I’m sending it. I have to send it.”

“Here, I just sent Lizzie’s, it’s on a group text, that fourth one is William’s number—”

“—got it,” Lydia says, dragging the photo to iMessage on her laptop and hitting send. “Perfect.”

They look at each other, smiling, and there is one beat of glorious silence before both of their phones go off near simultaneously. Lydia bursts into laughter and falls to the floor. Gigi is shaking with giggles that she doesn’t seem to be able to stop.

When they’ve both caught their breath, Lydia sits back up against the couch and nudges Gigi with her shoulder. “Nice one,” she says. She feels herself smiling still, her voice a little quiet from the laughter.

Gigi leans her head back on the couch and exhales a happy-sounding sigh. Then she sits up and pulls another album toward her. “So. Which of these have the photos of you?”

 

** 

Lydia isn’t quite sure how it’s become a routine, but it’s mid-March and Gigi has been over to her place every Wednesday night for the last five weeks. It’s the night when her mother is out at bridge club, and her father is gone doing something with his model trains (she thinks it might be trade shows, but she usually puts on a thin façade of interest and zones way out as soon as he starts talking about the things). Lydia doesn’t usually work on Wednesday nights, and without classes to take up time this year she’s been spending a lot of time hanging around at home. She’s watching a lot of Netflix and reading a lot of magazines and eating a lot of takeout.

She had texted Gigi about a week after the photo albums (“so bored, save me,” sent hanging upside-down off her bed and watching Gilmore Girls for the third time). Gigi, for some reason, had been really enthused. Lydia can only assume that her gap semester at Netherfield is a lot of focused portfolio-building and tennis-playing and… grounds-maintaining, or something. When she had mentioned this, a few days later, Gigi had laughed and told her that she wasn’t far off. 

“Honestly, I can’t wait to get back to school,” she had said, her voice a little tinny through the phone. “You were right, really, there’s not a lot to do around here when you don’t know many people.” Lydia had leapt at this (“Umm, actually I think I said Carter’s is less fun alone, so we should probably go,”) but she _was_ still in the middle of an episode and had half a box of Chinese left, so an hour later Gigi was sitting on her bed and Lydia was trying to figure out how to summarize four seasons’ worth of TV. Gigi had solved the problem by scrolling back to Episode 1 and clicking play.

Now they’re a solid three seasons into the show, and it’s six o’clock on Wednesday which means that soon Gigi will be here and they will order takeout. Lydia will tease Gigi for her super-cliché General Tso’s, which she finds a really funny typical order for a girl who has _literally been to China_ , and Gigi will dare Lydia to get something she’s never had before then, which she will. She’s pretty sure she’s on her way to ordering everything off the menu at this point. They’ll sit on the bed with Gigi leaning up against the headboard and Lydia flopped sideways with her head at a weird angle to see the screen. Gigi will make a joking, half-hearted attempt at getting her to watch a weird Wes Anderson movie, which she loves for the aesthetic and Lydia knows they’d just end up talking through. It’s getting as predictable as dragging Mary to Carter’s and while she really, _really_ wants to change that up by bring Gigi too, she finds that she actually likes knowing that she has these routines, these people she can expect to be there.

She knows it’s a bad habit, but she’s always texting Gigi when she’s hanging out with Mary, and sending Snapchat videos to Mary when she’s with Gigi. She’s actually always doing both of these, and sending snaps to Lizzie and Jane besides, but Mary and Gigi have both noticed the pattern and independently decided that they want the three of them to hang out. Lydia loves the idea, and although there’s a little knot of nerves inside her saying _what if they don’t get along_ , she thinks that since they’re both great, they probably will.

So tonight, in between bites of Szechuan Spicy Chicken and General Tso’s stolen from Gigi’s carton, she suggests that they all go out Friday. Gigi grins and says it’s about time, her smile lingering in a compact little happy grin that makes Lydia happy, too. She claps her hands and then texts Mary.

 

**

Lydia has spent the last hour in front of the mirror and her room is littered with outfits. At least they brighten up the room, she thinks; her parents wouldn’t let her paint the boring white walls, because once she hears back from the transfer applications she submitted this fall and _finally_ moves out, this will be a guest room. In the mean time, though, there are about sixteen shirts and dresses on the bed and floor. She’s settled on a dark pink top with floaty sleeves and a black skirt that she knows looks great on her—absolutely adorbs. She fixes her makeup, looks at the bed covered in outfits again, and is about to change into a dress when her phone buzzes. Her ride is here.

Mary is, of course, the designated driver. She pulls up in front of Lydia’s house in her beat-up used Honda Accord. “Ready for a night of _fun_?” she says when Lydia throws open the door. Her tone, as usual, sounds like an eye-roll, but Lydia knows she’s excited so she giggles and hugs her across the seat gap.

They get to Netherfield twenty minutes later, and Gigi is waiting outside the house. Mary’s eyes go sort of large at the size of the mansion, and it _is_ bigger than Lydia remembered, but Gigi is standing in front of it and it is really important that this go well, so she gives Mary a little shove and when Gigi opens the door Lydia is off, all _Gigi oh-em-gee this is going to be so great_ and _best night ever with the best, am I right?_ and Gigi laughs and introduces herself to Mary, who smiles a real smile.

By the time they get to Carter’s, Mary and Gigi are talking, actually talking, and Lydia is so glad she thinks she could burst. She sees Mary eyeing the tables across the room, but instead steers them towards the bar and sets them up at a corner where they can all see each other.

“This is nice!” Gigi says, peering around the room. “I haven’t been out in—oh, God, ages. And oh, wow, look, they have Just Dance, and _pinball!_ ”

“You found someone who will play with you, finally,” Mary says to Lydia, then “Thanks,” as the bartender sets down her usual soda in front of her. She adds in an aside to Gigi, “The pinball is actually pretty great, but don’t get her started on the Just Dance. She thinks she’s really good at it and she actually totally is.”

“Oh, she’s going _down_ ,” Gigi responds, lifting her chin a little to look down her nose at Lydia, who tries not to squirm at all and to raise an eyebrow in the coolest manner possible. “But hey! Drinks first, I think? Mary, they know yours already?”

“I think most of the people they get ordering soda are depressed about it,” Mary says, shrugging. “Guess they remember someone who doesn’t care. Also, we’re sort of here a lot.”

“Lyd doesn’t seem to have a regular, though,” notes Gigi, picking up one of the menu stands off the table and glancing at it. Lydia feels Mary look at her, but she isn’t sure why.

“Um, hello, you’ve seen me order Chinese, I like variety in my life,” Lydia says. “Also, there’s this deal where you can get like, a mixed drink sampler, but Lizzie and Jane are boring and mostly get ciders—”

“Let’s do it!” Gigi puts the stand back down on the table with a satisfying clack. “Hey, excuse me, can we have one of—whatever she just—yes, perfect.” A few minutes later there’s a neat row of little glasses sitting in front of them.

“I might be wrong, but that’s sort of a lot of drinks,” Mary observes.

“We’ve got this, cuz, don’t worry,” Lydia says cheerfully. She’s pretty sure she’s actually tried most of these drinks here before, but she is excited for the challenge and excited to drink with Gigi. “Come up with a toast for us!”

They end up toasting to cell phones (Mary gets a text from Eddie while she’s trying to come up with something), and then to apps (“Come on, that’s totally a fair followup!” says Gigi, and Lydia swats her and says “Dork”), and then to Lydia’s cat, for some reason, and then to some cat book series that apparently Mary and Gigi both used to be super into, and then Lydia is grabbing Gigi’s hand and pulling her over to the video games. She is a little more tipsy that she thought, she realizes as she stands up, but that’s okay, that’s perfect, today is _perfect._ “Did you know you’re perfect?” she tells Gigi, who laughs and hugs her and tells her that she is still absolutely about to lose at Just Dance.

They return to the bar a little out of breath. Lydia swings both arms above her head and goes _yessssssss_ probably too loudly, because Mary cocks an eyebrow at her as she looks up from her phone. Gigi throws an arm out at the same time as Lydia raises hers, and they collide. Gigi giggles and tries again and says, in a goofy formal voice, “Presenting your Dance Champion.” Lydia bows deeply to the hopefully-amused Mary and then looks at the drinks on the bar.

“Hey, there’s one left! Let’s go halfsies, Gigi, come on, it’s like your consolation prize for trying.” Gigi pretends to be indignant, but she rolls her lips in a little in a way that Lydia knows means she’s happy and takes a sip.

“ _All_ right, I think it’s time to go,” Mary says as Lydia tosses back her half of the drink. “This has been fun and all, but I think it’s time to sleep, or just to be not here.”

“ _That means she had a good time_ ,” Lydia stage-whispers to Gigi as they leave.

Half an hour later, after they’ve dropped Gigi off again outside the _still extremely gigantic_ Netherfield mansion, when they’re cruising down the highway back towards Lydia’s apartment with the window down and the radio on, Mary reaches over and turns off the music.

“So,” she says. Lydia is looking out the open window, trailing her fingertips in the rushing air, but she can tell Mary is looking at her and so she turns. Mary’s attention is back on the highway, but she glances over again.

“That sooooo fun, right?” Lydia still feels like she’s glowing, like someone replaced her heart with a two-hundred-watt bulb and it’s shining out through her chestbone.

“Yeah, I had fun,” Mary says, turning off of the highway. “She’s pretty great, isn’t she?”

“Ohmigosh, I’m so glad you liked her, I knew you would—”

“Lydia.”

Mary has pulled the car into a random parking lot. They’re about two minutes from Lydia’s apartment complex. Lydia isn’t sure where this conversation is going, or why the car has stopped. “What?”

“Look,” Mary says, “I dunno, okay, and I’m not going to try to get you to say anything you don’t want to, but I just wanted to say. I think you’re making a good call on this one. She’s really good.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Lydia says. She has too much warmth in her chest to be annoyed, but she is confused. She puts a frame on this mentally and notes to come back to it tomorrow to figure out what’s happening in this conversation.

“Lyd,” Mary says, and looks right at her. “It’s fine.” The moment feels serious, weighted.

“…Thank you?”

Mary sighs and puts the car back in drive. They coast the rest of the two minutes in silence, and Lydia thinks she maybe missed the chance to have a conversation about _something_ , but then they pull up in front of the apartment and Mary looks at her again and says “I’m glad you guys found each other, Lydia,” and something clicks and Lydia lets loose a stream of giggles, of _I’m not_ and _we’re not_ and _I mean, no_.

“Okay. All right,” Mary says, with a look more searching than the last few. “Good night, then.” Lydia gives her a thumbs-up and heads in to bed.

 

** 

(The next Wednesday, instead of sitting against the headboard, Gigi lies down on her stomach next to Lydia and bumps her shoulder. Lydia feels her stomach turn a loop and thinks, _oh._ )

 

**

Admissions decisions come out in April. Lydia hadn’t forgotten, exactly, not like she could with Lizzie building up to questions about it at the end of every conversation, but she’s just been—avoiding it. With Gigi. Avoiding talking about it. She isn’t sure why, but she circles around it, untouchable.

She knows Gigi’s waiting on applications too, grad school ones, design school. They’ve only ever talked about it by talking around it, about gap time and far-off future goals. But by two weeks from now they’ll know where they’ll both be come autumn and it…isn’t here, might not even be in California. Lydia’s got applications in at public universities up and down the state, but she’s honestly not sure where Gigi’s waiting to hear from. She pretends to herself that it doesn’t matter, but she Googles design schools in San Francisco on her phone at work and hopes Gigi liked some of them enough to apply.

They don’t talk about the fall, but they’ve talked about the future, because when your weird intense siblings are running successful companies it, you know, comes up in conversation. It comes up more and more. Texting. When they’re out at the mall, when Gigi visits her at work. They’re together a lot, these last few weeks. There’s a hopeful thrum in Lydia’s chest she can’t seem to make disappear now that she’s noticed it, and it’s getting stronger and louder by the moment. She spends a lot of time talking sternly to it in her head and sticking to what she knows is true _today_ and what in some world might be _someday_ and not anything that could happen in between.

Today, Lydia knows that she is lying on the perfectly-manicured lawn at Netherfield next to Gigi, and that it’s warm and sunny and Gigi’s smiling at her. She knows that she’s got half the classes for an English degree, and half the classes for a psych one, and she doesn’t know which to take, doesn’t much care, but. She thinks she could teach elementary school, someday. Gigi nods when she says this, with real thought, and tells her she thinks she’d be great at it. It’s not the gushing _oh, Lydia_ enthusiasm she got from Jane, and she hasn’t run this thought past Lizzie yet—she’s waiting to see what happens with schools, wants to have something concrete and impressive to share. Gigi seems to take the idea in and look at it, look at Lydia, and decide it makes sense.

Lydia looks back at her for a minute and smiles, quiet and pleased. She gets caught in her face for a moment, her sharp gentle eyes and the point of her nose and especially the curve of her mouth, and then the thrum in her chest gets too strong and she jumps up and says that she was promised a pool, so let’s _go_. Gigi laughs and stands up too. _Come on then,_ she says, grabs Lydia’s hand, and takes off at a run.

 

** 

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:53:41: Okay okaaaay but for real we need a new show now

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:54:16: And I get to pick and it’s downton abbey

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:54:21: You will love it

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:54:28: Swear to god

Lydia yawns and pulls the twisted comforter closer up to her chin. She has no real reason to still be awake, but no reason to get up early tomorrow either, and she’s only dropped her phone on her face once so far so she probably has another hour in her. As long as Gigi’s texting her, she’ll be up.

TO: Gigi Darcy: History class the tv show, seriously gg why would I

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:56:03: It isn’t and it’s the best. Swear to god!!!

TO: Gigi Darcy: Ugh

TO: Gigi Darcy: FINE

TO: Gigi Darcy: nerd

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 01:59:17: !!!!!!! Yes!!!!

Lydia closes her eyes and smiles. Tomorrow’s Wednesday. She won’t have to come up with plans to suggest, or to check her phone constantly waiting to see if Gigi will text her first—although she usually does. Lydia doesn’t know what to do with the strange balance of exhilaration and ease that’s buzzing around her when she's with Gigi these days.

TO: Gigi Darcy: Go to bedddd

She’s almost dozed off by the time the reply comes.

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 02:07: Can’t really sleep. Admissions decisions come out tomorrow.

Suddenly, Lydia isn’t sure that she will be able to sleep, either. Her phone buzzes again; Gigi is calling.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Lydia says, quietly. “Tomorrow, huh?”

“Tomorrow,” Gigi says, and pauses. “I don’t even know what I’m hoping, you know? There are four or five of them and any of them would be great, but, but, I don’t know. This is the next couple years of my life.”

“Tell me about it.” Then, carefully, probingly, “But I mean, how different could it be? Like, I mean, mine are tomorrow too, but I’ll be in-state no matter what, so.”

“ _Lydia_ , you didn’t tell me you find out tomorrow!”

“You didn’t, either, not until five minutes ago!”

Gigi is silent for a moment, and then says, “I know. I don’t know, though. Where I’ll be. And I’m hoping it’s San Francisco, near William and Lizzie and—and you,” and Lydia feels her heart speed up and her stomach do something strange, a now-familiar involuntary spurt of hope and longing flare in her chest. “I applied to one there. But. It could be New York, or Chicago, or Minnesota, or something else far away.”

Lydia shrugs, then realizes Gigi can’t see. “But you travel all the time.”

“Last time I was alone away at school, for the first couple years of undergrad, it was—I-I didn’t. I don’t know. You—you know.”

Lydia isn’t sure exactly what Gigi’s driving at, but she hears the tremor in her voice and says, “Gigi?”

“I joined the swim team.”

Oh. She doesn’t know what she was expecting, but somehow, incredibly, it was not this, she _forgot_ this. She is not sure what to say, or even what she is thinking besides the half-observation that the panic pooling in her stomach is not about what she would have thought it would be if they ever got around to having this conversation. “Gig, that was—that was a long time ago.”

“Yes. Yeah, it was,” Gigi says. It sounds sort of far-away. “Look, I’m—I’m sorry, I know this is probably not something you want to think about—”

“Gigi,” Lydia says, “No, Gigi, we can—”

“Because we haven’t been talking about this, and we don’t _need_ to talk about it, or I thought, I don’t know, if I didn’t mention—I’m not the one who’s, who’s hurting, I’m _fine_ , I’m stronger and I’m fine about this except when I think about going away again I just— _panic,_ so I thought if we didn’t talk about, about the fall and where we’re _going_ but it’s _tomorrow_ and—”

“It’s _okay!”_ Lydia says, loudly, too loud for 2 am in a small apartment with her parents asleep down the hall, but she knows this panic and she needs to cut across it, needs Gigi to hear her. “Shit, Gigi, please, listen. It’s not going to happen again. It won’t. _George_ won’t. You’ll get in. You will. You will. And Darcy will be there, and Lizzie will be there, and _I_ want to be there, but okay, that’s the reason I wasn’t talking about it, okay? About college? Because I want to be wherever you are, and not because—I had no idea this was about him for you, it’s— _I’m not hurting anymore, Gigi,_ and if you are, I want you to _tell me,_ okay?”

She hears the stifled sobs slow, Gigi’s breathing become calmer. “Okay?”

“Mm.” Another minute goes by. “Yes. Yeah. I’m okay.”

“It’ll be all right, Gig,” Lydia says. She holds the phone tight. 

“It will be all right,” Gigi repeats.

There are a few minutes of silence on the line.

“Lyd?”

“Mm?”

“Thanks. Love you.”

“Obvs,” Lydia says, something within her loosening a little and something else twisting a little tighter.

 

**

Gigi gets in, of course, to the MFA program for design at California College of the Arts in San Francisco. She shows up on Lydia’s doorstep waving a screenshot on her phone. Her whole face is radiant, and she falls onto Lydia and pulls her into a hug as soon as the door is open. Lydia is practically melting with relief herself. Her heart contorts as Gigi hangs on to her, her face buried against Lydia’s neck. She doesn’t know what she would have done or what she would have said if this situation were different; she is glad, so glad, that she doesn’t have to find out. She isn’t sure if that’s a selfless thought or a selfish one.

Lydia is waitlisted at San Francisco State University, but gets into a few others, more than she expected—state universities in Chico, East Bay, and Sacramento. She waits to tell Gigi until they’re sitting on her bed, manic celebratory energy spent in hugging and squealing, ciders half gone. Her voice comes out sort of quiet, and she knows Gigi can tell San Fran was her first choice. Gigi’s face drops a little, her mouth twisting into a tight line of concern; she seems unsure of what to say. With a practiced motion, Lydia pulls her personality back on like a jacket and finds the shock and hope and happiness she had found on checking those first few results before San Fran, turns them into energy and words and pushes them towards Gigi. She thinks _today should be about you_ and _I am happy_.

She feels like they’ve dropped it, but Gigi evidently doesn’t. They spend another half hour on the MFA program website and start in on the first ten minutes of the first episode of Downton Abbey. Lydia guesses it doesn’t immediately seem awful, but when she turns to tell Gigi, she’s already looking at her pensively. She reaches across Lydia and pauses the show.

“So do you know where you think you’re going, then?”

Lydia looks away and shrugs. Sacramento is less than two hours from San Francisco. “I don’t know yet. I guess I have to think about it some more.” She grins, then, and flashes back to Gigi. “But I have so many options, Gig, I’m finally starting the rest of my life!”

Gigi reaches out, puts a hand on Lydia’s arm. Lydia is intensely aware of the contact. “You wanted to be near Lizzie, though. I mean, I’m so excited for you, these are all great schools, but—people get in off waitlists all the time, Lyd. And some of these places aren’t that long a drive. You can come for long weekends.”

“It’s whatevs, I’ll be fine.”

“Of course you will, you’re Lydia, “ Gigi says, smiling. Lydia bumps her with her shoulder, and Gigi bumps her back, then puts her head on Lydia’s shoulder. They sit that way for a minute. Lydia feels warmth smooth over the other emotions she’s pushing down in her chest.

“I’m going to miss you,” Gigi says, quietly. “I thought you might be there.”

Gigi would have been all right, Lydia thinks, in New York or Minnesota or anywhere else; she is effervescent and headstrong and unselfish and so relentlessly herself. She is the most amazing person Lydia knows. She leans her head down onto Gigi’s. “You’ll be fine without me there,” she says, looking ahead at the wall. “You’d be great anywhere.”

“I know.”

She lifts her head and looks at Gigi, whose eyes seem to be giving weight to the words.

“I was panicking, Lydia. I didn’t know what was going to happen and I was scared and—you know, it’s like when everything is scary, even the things that usually seem all right sometimes don’t anymore?”

Lydia nods.

“But I’m basically okay, about George. I mean, he didn’t hurt me like he hurt you—” Lydia’s eyes flash, and Gigi amends quickly, “I mean. I was hurt. For a long time. You’ve seen the Domino videos.”

“He hurt you,” Lydia says. “Don’t try to put a number on how much damage the asshole did.”

Gigi shifts her weight on the bed, nods. “Okay. It happened. But my point is, it was years ago, and I still don’t like thinking about it, but I’m also really basically okay. Yesterday wasn’t me, it was panic.”

“I know,” Lydia says.

“We never really talked about George,” Gigi adds, tentatively.

The room feels very quiet. Lydia nudges the laptop with her foot, the characters still frozen on the screen. She doesn’t want to get this wrong. She stands up, walks over to the desk, picks up some piece of nothing and fidgets with it for a minute, and when she turns back to the bed Gigi is still watching her.

“No,” Lydia says finally, sitting back down on the edge of the bed next to Gigi, who is leaning against the headboard. “I mean even still when I met you, obviously, I—he was a lot of what I thought about. And I didn’t think that would ever change?” Gigi nods. “But it did. When I said I’m not hurting anymore, I’m _not_. Not usually.” She looks right at Gigi, now, and says, her voice strong, “I mean, fuck him. But I’m okay. You know?”

Gigi nods again, and her face is serious, and relieved, and something unreadable. “I know.”

They sit in the quiet for a few minutes, and then Lydia nods and unpauses the TV show, scoots back to lean against the headboard next to Gigi. The air between them isn’t tense, it’s—something. Not bad, Lydia thinks, not _off_ , just a little different. She thinks it could be good.

 

**

Gigi really is extraordinarily good at tennis, Lydia thinks. She’s lying on a pool chair next to Netherfield’s clay courts reading a magazine and watching Gigi train. Lydia isn’t great at the game—she runs, so she’s in decent shape, but she’s just not sure what to do with a racket in her hand. Gigi’s started pushing for a tennis lesson, though, and Lydia’s pretty bad at saying no to her these days, especially when saying yes means a Gigi smile and a few more hours at Netherfield, so. She’s today’s cooldown match. In the meantime, she pretends to read about celebrities and watches through her sunglasses as Gigi slams serve after serve exactly into place.

Lydia tries sometimes, when her heart is pushing itself too high into her throat, to tell herself that this thing she has for Gigi is just a _friends_ thing, that the fact that her insides are doing this sort of hopelessly unstoppable flopping is pretty meaningless. That she can talk her stomach out of turning over on itself whenever Gigi’s near her and find out the crush isn’t a crush. She wonders if maybe she’d be able to if her attempts were less half-hearted.

She’s never felt this way about a girl before, but she’s never felt about _anyone_ the way she feels about Gigi—all the boys were for the thrill of the flirt and the pleasure of the hookups, and George was different by half. She thinks that the girl thing should probably be weirder for her than it is, but. It’s _Gigi._ When she’s alone at home she’ll wonder, sometimes, if she’s imagining this, but then she’ll get a text and her heart will soar a little loop. So there's really no way it isn't a crush, she guesses. Maybe a huge one.

She really should figure out a way to stop it in its tracks, she thinks idly, as Gigi comes jogging towards her, but what the hell.

“Not too bored, I hope?” Gigi asks. “I’m just about done.”

“Time for me to take my place in the limelight?” Lydia says, closing her magazine. “I’m totes going to kick your ass, just so you know.”

Gigi laughs, and Lydia can feel her mock-serious face twisting into a bit of a smile against her will. “Of course you are.”

Lydia has just stood up and is putting her phone into her oversized beach bag when it starts to buzz in her hand. It’s Lizzie. Lydia is conflicted. “One sec, sorry,” she says to Gigi, “I’ll just tell Lizzie I’ll call her back.” It’s late morning on a Sunday, so this isn’t a between-meetings sort of say-hi call, and there’ll be plenty of time later in the day to catch up.

“Hey Lizzie,” she says into the phone, “Miss me?” and continues on, “Listen, I’m at Gigi’s, so can I—” but Lizzie is talking over her.

“Lydia, _Lydia_ , prepare yourself for the best news you will _ever_ hear,” Lizzie says, and Lydia is not sure she has ever felt joy burst through a phone quite so tangibly before. Lizzie’s voice is basically glowing.

There is literally only one thing this can be, and Lydia is not quite sure how to respond, so before Lizzie can, breathless, tack on another sentence, she says, “You’re casting me in a movie and I’m going to be famous and rich?”

Lizzie doesn’t even slow down, all energy and momentum. “He _asked me_ , Lydia, and it was so _romantic_ , and I can’t believe it, I’m just, _ahhhhhhh.”_ Her voice rises. “I mean I knew it was coming, because you know we had discussed it, but that was in the abstract, and this is real, and—are you there, Lydia?”

Lydia says, “Holy _shit_ , Lizzie,” and then takes the phone away from her mouth a little and yells at the sky, “MY SISTER IS ENGAGED!” and when she brings the phone back to her ear Lizzie is laughing.

“Tell me _everything_ ,” Lydia says. “Ohmigod, Lizzie, I can’t—did he propose on a _Sunday morning?”_

“Well, um,” Lizzie says, drawing out the words a little.

“Oh, _gross_ , I do not need to know, never mind, so it was last night?”

“He made me a video,” Lizzie says dreamily, and Lydia snorts a little bit involuntarily. Looking up, she sees that Gigi has her hands over her mouth, her eyes sparkling. Lizzie is still talking, though. “I’ll tell you about it later, I have to call Mom and there is no way _that_ call will take less than two hours, but you are going to sit through every detail.”

“Um, obvs! Love you, and _congrats,_ ” says Lydia, with a _holy-shit_ arm wave at Gigi.

“Love you too, Lydia, _ahhhhhhh_ ,” Lizzie says, and hangs up.

Lydia looks at Gigi, and Gigi looks at Lydia, and they are both squealing and grabbing each other’s hands and Lydia tosses her phone on the chair and they do some sort of spin around the court, and when they stop they both fall over onto Lydia’s chair. “Finally, oh my _god,_ ” says Gigi, “He’s had the ring for _weeks_.”

Lydia’s stomach feels a little weird, and not from the spinning and not from Gigi’s hand still in her own. It’s anxiety and it’s loss and it’s mixed in with enormous happiness for Lizzie, who called her, who wants to tell her the details, who is getting married, who is so so happy, and so she laughs, just laughs and laughs, and when she catches her breath she aims a fake glare at Gigi and says, “You _knew_ , traitor, is that why your brother hasn’t called yet?”

Gigi’s eyes widen even more and she goes _oh my god!_ and runs to grab her own phone out of her bag on the other side of the court. Lydia sees her grab it in what must be mid-ring.

Lydia sits all the way back up on the lawn chair and texts Lizzie a bunch of emojis, bells and confetti and rings and hearts. Almost immediately, she gets back a selfie. Lizzie is beaming. Lydia smiles back down at her phone involuntarily and decides that there are worse things than a happy sister and a Darcy-sponsored wedding.

 

**

The engagement party is at the very end of May. Looking around, Lydia is impressed by how fast Lizzie and Darcy were able to pull together something this, well, _elegant_. The courtyard restaurant’s wood and stone walls rise to a glass ceiling, and she thinks that if she squinted past the fairy lights she’d be able to see the stars. There’s a slideshow running on one wall and the space is big enough that there are two _separate_ playlists running. Lizzie spent hours on them, but she’s been shrugging off compliments all night. Still, Lydia sees her grin every time she turns away. Lizzie has been her own brand of tightly-controlled manic all week; now, it’s mellowed into a focused happiness that is almost tangible.

It’s amazing to see Jane, who Lydia hasn’t seen since New Year’s. Somehow, the time has gone by faster than she thought it would, but that doesn’t change the fact that they have months to catch up on. Bing still has a place in San Francisco, and Lydia and her parents are staying with him and Jane; Charlotte and Gigi are at Darcy and Lizzie’s place. Both apartments are incredibly nice. Lydia had asked Jane whether their New York place was as big, throwing as much wink as she could into every part of the sentence. Jane had gotten flustered and said that they were still taking things _slowly_ , Lydia, and that the apartment in New York was Bing’s and not hers, and shouldn’t they go see if Mom wanted any help unpacking. Lydia gives it maybe a few months tops until engagement number two.

Tonight is Lizzie’s, though, and even though Lizzie and Darcy are the ultimate nerds, Lydia has to admit that this isn’t just a beautiful event—it’s also an _awesome_ party. There’s a fancy dinner, a whole bunch of tall tables, and down at the end a bar and dance floor that she checked out as soon as she got here. Lydia’s at what she thinks is traditionally the Family Table, with Lizzie and Darcy, Jane and Bing, Charlotte, Gigi, and Fitz. Their parents are at the next one over talking to Catherine de Bourgh, who is one of about a hundred people Lydia’s met tonight. She doesn’t even know how the Darcebot knows this many other people, guesses that some of them are employees. Gigi had laughed and confirmed the guess. “But you’d be surprised,” she had added, and then, “Oh no, let’s go,” grabbing Lydia’s elbow and steering her away from the infamous Catherine de Bourgh. “If I have to hear her talk about _potential ways of advancing my C.V._ one more time I am going to scream.”

It’s sort of strange, seeing Gigi somewhere that isn’t Lydia’s turf. She’s met three or four of her old friends tonight, girls from high school and college whose names she sees sometimes when Gigi’s phone buzzes on her bed. It’s weird also seeing how close Lizzie and Gigi are; she knows they talk, but she hasn’t seen them together since Gigi came to Netherfield.

Lydia had been unsure how she’d split her time when she was over at the Darcy apartment, when to be with Lizzie and when to be with Gigi, but she hadn’t realized that mostly they’d be together. Gigi hangs onto Lizzie’s words in a way that makes Lydia’s stomach clench, and there’s an easy air of camaraderie between them that makes her want to leave, or push her way into the frame, or both. But then Lizzie keeps asking her opinions on party things and wedding things and she relaxes a little into the attention, reminds herself of things she knows. And Gigi smiles at her, texts her from the next room, grabs her hand when she’s showing her around, and Lydia reminds herself of things like how to breathe.

Gigi’s up from the dinner table and over at the bar, now, talking to someone Lydia doesn’t know. Fitz is standing with her; from the corner of her eye, Lydia seems him laughing and chatting too. He’s a great guy. Lydia likes him a lot, has since she first saw him in Lizzie’s videos. Earlier, when the whole table was talking, he’d cracked a joke that she still hasn’t quite stopped giggling over. Jane has paused a couple times in the last few minutes to give a sort of bemused smile at Lydia’s sudden giggles before continuing on about her ideas for bridesmaid dresses.

Charlotte and Lizzie are laughing about something across the table, and Darcy is smiling, watching them, contributing occasionally. Bing is—somewhere, Lydia isn’t sure. She’s about to try to time an exit over to the dance floor when he reappears, entreating Jane to dance with him.

“Oh, I don’t know, Bing, I’m talking to Lydia,” Jane says, looking apologetically from one to the other. “Can I meet you there in a few minutes, maybe?”

“No, go!” Lydia says, “I’ll be over there soon anyway.” Jane still looks a little uncertain, but she stands up, so Lydia blows her a kiss and waves her hand at them. “Go!”

As they leave, Fitz walks back over. “Darce, my man, your sister wants you over near the dance floor,” he says, clapping a hand on Darcy’s back and then swinging down into the chair beside Lydia. “Something about a ‘dance with her best brother,’ I dunno dude, your sister is a handful when she’s tipsy.”

Darcy stands up and does an awkward mock-salute at the table. “It seems I’m being summoned. I’ll be back shortly, I expect. Or maybe not so shortly.” He bends down and kisses Lizzie, and his hand lingers on her shoulder as he stands back up.

“Go on,” Lizzie says, “Go dance with my sister-in-law. It’s sweet.”

“She’s not,” Lydia says, more sharply than she means to. “Your in-law. You’re not married yet.”

“Okay, that’s true,” Lizzie replies, sounding amused, “But does it matter?”

Lydia shrugs. She watches Gigi, who waves at her and then beckons Darcy, bouncing on her toes as she does. He gestures back at her and heads for the dance floor.

“Come on, Lizzie, let’s go too,” says Charlotte suddenly.

“You just want to see if he’s actually a good dancer,” Lizzie says, making a face at her. “I’ve told you, that first time was a fluke. A terrible… dramatically terrible… fluke.”

“Okay, maybe,” Charlotte concedes, “But I have no proof, so.”

And then Lizzie and Charlotte are gone as well.

Lydia’s never been alone with Fitz before, and as much as she likes him, she isn’t really sure what they’ve got to talk about. He’s fiddling attentively with his napkin, folding it this way and that. She’s about to say something about the food when he straightens up and sets before her an origami crane.

“Aww, it’s adorbs,” she says, picking it up and turning it over. “They’re usually not this floppy, though, are they?”

“What can I say. All I had was the napkin, and I am a master of my craft,” Fitz says seriously. The effect is slightly ruined by his raising his eyebrows at her and nodding proudly as the bird’s neck droops over. Lydia laughs.

“Where’s your boyfriend?” she asks. “Gigi thought he’d be here tonight.”

“Sick,” Fitz says. “I’m supposed to bring back soup on my way back. Actually, he said to smuggle out whatever the caterer brought, but I think it’s all back in the kitchen now. I’m sure he’ll wish he’d been here though. We’ve heard a lot about you from GGD.”

Lydia can feel herself blushing, but laughs over it and says with maybe a little less bravado than she would like, “Yeah, like how great I am?”

“Something like that,” Fitz says, and then he just sits and looks at her with a little bit of a smile on his face until Lydia has to look away. She picks up the floppy crane, its folds almost entirely falling apart by now, and halfheartedly attempts to poke it back into shape. When she looks up again, Fitz is still watching her, like some big persistent puppy waiting for a treat.

“What?” Lydia says, and hides her face a little bit. “ _What?_ ”

“I dunno, Little B, you tell me,” says Fitz, and keeps sitting. It’s like he’d be content to just hang out in this chair waiting for her to say something for hours.

Lydia groans a little and then goes, “Okay, _fine,_ ” because she’s going insane from not talking about this to anyone except Mary, who she thinks is getting tired of her rambling lovesick texts, but also because the persistent hopeful nudge in her chest makes her think that maybe, _maybe_. And that Fitz might know the answer. She doesn’t know what she’ll do if he does; she thinks she might be relieved, somehow, if he says Gigi is uninterested, like she finally has the wherewithal to talk herself out of this thing. If he says the opposite—she doesn’t know, but her heart is racing suddenly.

“Fine what?”

“Oh my god, you _know_ ,” she says, and leans her face against the table. “God, Fitz, I just like her so much.”

“Hey, hey,” Fitz says, patting her shoulder. “That’s chill.”

“Oh my god,” Lydia says, “Fuck, oh my god,” and she sits bolt upright, all of a sudden panicked. “She totally knows. That’s how you know. She totally knows.”

Fitz shakes his head. “Honestly, Little B, I don’t think she has a clue. I just,” he wiggles his fingers near his eyes, “noticed.”

Lydia puts her face back down against the table and groans into the tablecloth, “Why am I so obvious.”

“You’re a noticeable person—good noticeable, it’s good—and she’s my friend,” Fitz says. She can hear the shrug in his voice. “Look, I don’t wanna say anything you don’t already know, but it’s not impossible. Like, logistically.” Lydia tilts her head to the side and looks at him. “Like, she bats for both teams.”

“I know,” Lydia says.

“But I also don’t wanna get your hopes up—I mean, it’s obvious you’re important to her,” Fitz says, and his voice is serious now. “But, and I am _breaching confidentiality_ here, but I know she had feelings for someone else before. Wouldn’t tell me who. Okay, that’s a lie, I know who. Doesn’t matter. But far as I know, that’s not over, Little B.”

She is not sure if she is relieved or crushed, just that she can hear her breathing again over the racing of her heart. It is loud.

“You’re good for her, though. Stick around,” Fitz says, and pats her shoulder. “Right, I’m going to get another drink, want one?”

Suddenly, Lydia really, really does want another drink. “Thanks,” she says, but it doesn’t quite come out the first time. She tries again. “Thanks. But I can get my own.” Just to go somewhere, do something. She doesn’t know. She needs to think, or to not think, or—or for everything to stop for a while.

Fitz grins and points and her, and they walk over to the bar. By the time she’s downed something strong with a lot of rum in it, she is laughing at Fitz’s jokes again, and another strong drink later and she’s convinced herself that this is all for the best, because if she doesn’t want to think about this, she’ll get over it, right?

Someone else comes to talk to Fitz, and she’s sitting at the bar staring into space when Gigi comes and grabs her hand.

“There you are, Lydia, let’s dance!” she says. Her face is a little flushed and her hair is curling in soft ringlets around her face and she is stupidly, impossibly beautiful.

Fuck it, Lydia thinks, and gets up to dance with her.

 

** 

So it’s summer.

Lydia doesn’t leave for Sacramento State until the end of August, doesn’t even head out for her transfer student orientation until the end of June. In between is a long stretch of long days. She figures she’ll put in a bunch of extra hours at the movie theater. She’ll have the time, because Gigi will be gone already. She and her brother have longstanding vacation plans for all of July. They’re going to Italy for some festival that sounds colorful and amazing and, you know, not here, but whatever. Neither Gigi nor Lydia was ever going to stay, so this whole thing has been a countdown anyway.

Lydia knows Gigi was planning to head home to San Fran the week after the party, although she isn’t sure exactly when. She’s waited a few days before bringing it up, a little on edge the whole time. She ends up asking over the opening credits of Downton, tilting her head down to look at Gigi’s where it rests against her shoulder.

“I thought I’d stick around,” Gigi says, “Until your orientation? William and I don’t fly out until the beginning of July, and I can come back in August to get my stuff from Netherfield.” Lydia glows a little, but manages to keep it under control until Gigi adds, “That way I can see you again before school starts!” and squeezes her hand.

Lydia wrestles with herself for a second, steps on the bolts of hope that shoot through her chest, and wins, mostly. She finds an expression that she hopes looks normal and squeezes back. “That sounds amazeballs.”

“Right? Shh, oh, it’s starting!” Gigi says.

“After the end of season three, who cares,” Lydia says, rolling her eyes, but she quirks a smile when Gigi swats her and settles in to spend an hour paying attention to melodramatic television and arguing down the stupid voice in her heart when it starts whispering again.

She’s let herself spend a few days wallowing, but when Gigi’s around she forgets she’s supposed to be miserable and when she’s alone it does nothing except make her feel like shit and spend too much time on social media. So.

If what Fitz says is true—and she’s not sure who would know better than him—then okay, this is never going to happen. And that’s okay, she tells herself, a little angry at how resistant she is to believe it. If what Fitz says is true, everything she thinks has indicated _maybe_ doesn’t actually mean anything at all, not like that. But it does mean _something_ , she thinks fiercely, it means that she matters to Gigi, and that’s what matters most.

So when Gigi leans into her shoulder again halfway through the episode, and twin hope and happiness blossom somewhere in her chest, she carefully picks the latter and pretends the former doesn’t exist at all.

 

**

Despite being basically a day-long info session snoozefest, orientation is somehow actually really exciting. Lydia doesn’t really know what shifted, but she catches herself looking forward to classes for the first time in, like, maybe ever. (She texts this to Mary and to Lizzie, who she thinks will be pleased.) There are also a couple of workshops running, so she goes to ones about careers and clubs and, because why the hell not, study abroad. She Snapchats the Italy brochure to Gigi, even though she knows she’s still on the plane.

Outside of the orientation events, it seems like campus in the summer is pretty quiet. Lydia has some time to kill, so she bums around the University Union for a few hours playing games on her phone and people-watching. She notices a lot of cute boys walking through, flirts with a few of them, and even surprises herself by blushing when this one very pretty dark-haired girl strikes up a conversation. This could be fun, she thinks. She wishes there were a party happening here tonight that she could check out, somewhere she could get tipsy and dance and scope out her future classmates and ride this wave of college hype.

By the time she gets back to Lizzie’s that night, she’s still excited, but the two hours of driving time have sunk in and it’s all compounded with feeling weird and lonely and more than a little uncertain. When Lizzie opens the door, Lydia drops her stuff and hugs her harder than she needs to. “Hey, you, what’s up?” Lizzie says, pulling back and looking at her quizzically. “How was orientation?” When Lydia shrugs, she says, “You’ll love Sac State, Lyd.”

“Yeah, I know.” Lydia turns her face away, looks down for a second. “It’s just been a long day.” She looks up again and smiles, letting more energy come out in her voice. “I went to like, fifty million information sessions. Which were surprisingly cool, actually. Want to see my flyers?”

“Better watch out, or you’ll turn into a nerd like me,” Lizzie teases. “Come on, let’s go sit on the couch.”

They’re halfway through the flyers when Lydia and Lizzie’s phones buzz almost simultaneously. She can tell from Lizzie’s face that her message is from Darcy. She’s pretty sure her own face would betray that hers is from Gigi, if she thought Lizzie had any idea at all.

“Oh, it’s Will,” Lizzie says, and reaches for her laptop on the coffee table. “Do you mind if I pull up Domino for a few minutes? He just landed, but I think I’ll be asleep by the time they get to the hotel.”

“It’s still super weird to hear you call him that,” Lydia says, wrinkling her nose. “But yeah, no prob.”

Darcy and Gigi are in a rush, and that’s probably good, because when the video stream connects she gets this weird, stinging combination rush of happiness and longing that she knows she’s doing a bad job at hiding. It feels like it’s been a lot more than three days.

Later, after Lizzie’s gone to sleep and she’s settled into the absurdly nice guest room, Lydia refreshes the SF State website on her phone a few times, willing there to be an update on the waitlist. There isn’t. So she writes a long email on her phone to Gigi about orientation and the classes she registered for, then lies awake in the king-size bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to imagine the future.

 

_**_  

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:27:03: Okay anyway I know we’ve been over this before but Iiiiiii don’t like time zones

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:27:21: Like I’m used to “oh hey, I miss lydia, I’ll text her”

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:28:00: But now you are always asleep

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:28:08 When I want to talk to you I mean

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:28:18: Not always obvs

To: Gigi Darcy: Says the one thats about to go to sleep :P

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:29:57: OKAY excuse you ms bennet William insists we start every day at like 9am

To: Gigi Darcy: You poor tortured soul

To: Gigi Darcy: Maybe you should put a pillow over his head while he sleeps

To: Gigi Darcy: Also I knew that lol midnight to bedtime is like the only time we overlap besides now

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp: 15:35:02: If you would wake up before noon!!!

To: Gigi Darcy: Okay I’ll set an alarm for 11 happy?

To: Gigi Darcy: Just for you loser

From: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp: 15:37:25: <3

To: Gigi Darcy: <3

Lydia bounces her phone in her hand. Every instinct she has is telling her to flirt and every part of her brain is screaming at her that flirting with Gigi is a terrible hopeless useless idea that will make everything weird. She doesn’t know. She hasn’t seen Gigi in three weeks and is going a little crazy, reading too far into meaningless things like fucking “I want to talk to you.” Of course Gigi wants to talk to her, that’s what friends do.

To: Gigi Darcy: Come back soon, I want to finish downton

From: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp: 15:39:08: Of course :) I miss you!!

They are _friends._

To: Gigi Darcy: Good night weirdo

To: Gigi Darcy: I miss you too

From: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 15:41:10: Good night… Or good afternoon!! 

Lydia picks up a pillow from the couch and yells into it. Kitty startles from the armrest and dashes out of the room.

“Everything okay, dear?” her mom calls from the other room.

“Fine,” she shouts back, and puts the pillow back over her face.

 

**

When Gigi shows up at her doorstep the first week of August, tan and beaming, Lydia hugs her so hard that she almost drops the souvenirs she’s holding.

Two hours by car is going to feel like nothing at all.

 

**

Gigi’s been back for four days. Lydia can’t stop reading signals that aren’t there. She _knows_ they aren’t there, because Fitz said so and he _knows,_ Gigi _told him_. But she can’t stop imagining them. She also can’t stop herself from watching Gigi out of the corner of her eye or from leaning into every casual touch. She’s been doing a lot of what she thinks is method acting, trying to inhabit the role of someone who is not pointlessly and endlessly in love with her best friend. She’s getting a little better at it, she thinks. Maybe when she gets to Sac State she’ll try out for a play.

It’s Friday afternoon, and Gigi’s at Netherfield for the rest of the weekend. She drives back to San Francisco on Monday morning. She’s been “packing,” which mostly means throwing her stuff in piles across the mansion. There’s tons of stuff in every other room, and there are about forty rooms. Gigi claims it’s a system, which Lydia maybe 45% believes. There’s no way that any functional system puts a boxed set of DVDs in the same pile as a bunch of sweaters and a whisk. It’s not like Lydia’s own packing is going much better, but at least she has three weeks on Gigi, and she quit the movie theater at the end of July to give her more time this week and here on out.

She and Gigi are sitting on a balcony at Netherfield looking out over the lawn. It’s their second-to-last weekend night; they’ve each suggested halfheartedly a few times that they go to Carter’s, or check out one of the other couple of places in town, but at some point one of them got up and found a bottles of wine. Now it’s mostly empty and they’re contemplating sticking around out here for the sunset. It won’t be for at least two or three more hours, but Lydia’s very comfortable with her head in Gigi’s lap and a warm wine buzz floating around her ears.

She is contemplating refilling her glass when her phone chirps. It’s an email.

 

_Dear Lydia,_

_This year the Office of Admissions has found itself in the happy position of being able to offer a small number of students late admission off the waitlist. We are pleased to offer you a space in our incoming transfer class this fall._

_We understand that this is late notice, and as such we are additionally extending you the option to defer admission for up to one semester and enroll in the spring. Students sometimes take this opportunity to travel abroad with one of our Transfers Abroad programs, which begin in late September._

_An email will follow early next week providing the link to confirm your decision to attend and to declare your choice of semester in which to enroll. We look forward to seeing you on campus._

_The Admissions Office of San Francisco State University_

 

She screams and puts her hand over her mouth and thrusts the phone up at Gigi, who looks somewhere between confused and alarmed. She grabs the phone and reads it, her face flickering through shock and relief and joy and excitement. Lydia has jumped up and Gigi leaps up too, and Lydia sort of falls onto her and they are hugging each other and Lydia thinks she might be shaking a little.

“I’m so glad, I’m just, I’m so,” Gigi keeps saying, “Lydia, _you did it, it’s happening_ , oh my god, oh my god.”

Lydia runs to the balcony, leans as far over it as she can, and yells at the top of her lungs. The sound started in her throat as a _yes!_ but ends up a rush of noise, loud and honest and joyful. She feels like she might burst. She is on fire. She is definitely trembling. “I did it,” she says to Gigi, “I get to be there this fall. Holy shit.”

“We need to celebrate,” Gigi says, decisive, “I’ll go get—hang on—” She runs back into the house. Lydia fires off quick texts to Lizzie and Jane and Mary and her parents, and then Gigi’s back with a tote bag full of bottles. “I just threw some stuff from the bar in,” she says breathlessly.

Gigi is a genius. “Hell yes!” Lydia crows and reaches for one of them.

“No, we have to toast,” Gigi insists, swinging the bag out of her reach. “This is a big deal and I am excited and I want to make a toast,”

“Then go get a toaster,” Lydia says, giggling, making another half-hearted swipe for the bag and then sitting back. She waves her glass at Gigi, happy and tipsy. “Or pour me some whatever, come on.”

Gigi opens a couple bottles and pours a generous measure of liquid into both glasses in a mixture that is either fancy or completely haphazard. She hands one back to Lydia and then stands up. Lydia starts to stand up too, but Gigi goes _nonono_ and gestures at her and she sits back down.

“To my beautiful, brilliant best friend,” Gigi says, raising her glass, “who against all odds made what was going to be this stupid boring semester the best ever, and who I was going to miss spectacularly and who now I won’t even have the chance miss at all, seriously, I’m so _so_ glad you’re going to be there, Lydia, and you deserve this more than anyone in the world, really. Um, to you!”

There’s a lump in Lydia’s throat and she doesn’t think she can stop smiling. She says “Shut _up._ ” into the edge of her cup, but she reaches out and grabs Gigi’s hand and squeezes it and she thinks that Gigi knows what she means because she squeezes back.

They stay on the balcony through a sunset, a few hours, and several strong drinks. A little after the sun goes down they drag a small couch outside (“All our stuff is here!” Gigi defends herself, gesturing at the very small cluster of shoes and bottles. “Why move it all back inside?”). It’s dark now, and the bugs are out, and they’re sitting on the couch very close together. Lydia feels sated and happy and warm, like everything is right. There’s a quiet moment, a lull in what’s become a sort of nothing time of half-conversations, and she says, “I’m glad too, you know.”

“Mmm?”

“That you came here this semester. That I met you. I don’t know. Mostly that I’m going to be in San Francisco this fall.”

“Near Lizzie,” Gigi says and Lydia giggles.

“No. I mean, yeah. But mostly near you.”

Gigi is so close. She is flushed from the wine and the rum and her hair is down and messy and she is smiling, smiling at Lydia. Her face is so close. Lydia leans forward, just a little, and she thinks Gigi does too.

All of a sudden a spike of panic launches through her, and it’s the sudden conviction that she’s wrong, she’s seeing things wrong, it’s Fitz’s voice saying _someone else_ and Lizzie’s saying _in-law,_ and the thought of a million family gatherings, and if she fucks this up she is going to have to live with it for the rest of her life, and if only she weren’t so goddamn drunk she might know if, fuck, _fuck, fuck_.

“Um. Um, my stomach feels weird,” she says, “Bathroom,” and dashes inside without searching for Gigi’s face in the dark. She isn’t sure she can bear to see what expression it holds.

By the time she emerges ten minutes later, she thinks it might be safe. “False alarm,” she says as she steps back out onto the porch, “but I stayed just in case. Um, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Gigi says, but it sounds weird. “I got you water. Here.” She hands the glass to Lydia, who takes it.

“I’m not sure I’m good to drive,” Lydia says. She tries to make it sound as normal as possible but she isn’t really sure what her voice is doing anymore. “I mean I’m definitely not.”

“You’re staying, obviously.” This is better. Maybe. This sounds like Gigi, if Gigi were someone else pretending to be Gigi. Lydia nods, grasps for a response and doesn’t find one, and instead nods again. “I think I have extra pajamas.”

She ends up with the pajamas, somehow, and it is only when she is sitting with them in the dark on the edge of the guest room bed that she allows herself to curl up and cry.

 

**

Lydia wakes up with a headache and a low drone of anxiety buzzing at the edge of her mind. She wants to leave both behind in the tangle of sheets she’s half kicked off the bed during the night. She remembers everything. As she swings herself out of bed, a little fuzzy and a little jittery, she tells herself that if she acts like everything is normal, it will be. Even though maybe normal could have been something different. If she hadn’t fucked everything up. No. Okay. Whatever. She needs water.

When she gets to the kitchen, Gigi is already moving around at the range. “Oh, hey, you’re up,” she says. Her voice is cheerful, but she looks exhausted. “I’m making eggs and toast. Also, there’s coconut water on the table. It’s amazing for hangovers.”

Her smile takes some of the immediacy off of Lydia’s anxiety. So maybe they’re fine? Lydia shuffles over to the table. “Thanks. How are you even this alive right now?”

“I’ve been awake for a while,” Gigi says. “I—I couldn’t really sleep much, actually. I’ll crash later. Oh! Plus Advil. That’s on the table too.”

“You’re the best,” Lydia says, and takes a sip of the coconut water. It’s good.

Gigi brings the eggs and toast over to the table a few minutes later. They sit mostly in headachey silence, chewing. A couple of times, Gigi takes a breath like she’s about to say something. Lydia cuts across her each time, blurts out dumb stuff like _I fucking love eggs_ and _Seriously Gigi, what the hell, do you have coconut water around_ all _the time_? Gigi goes with it, sort of. Lydia feels too gross to try to figure out what she’s thinking. This is close enough to normal that she can pretend them the rest of the way there.

When the plates are in the sink and Lydia’s changed into more borrowed clothing, Gigi, shifting her weight awkwardly, says that she thinks she needs to pack now.

“Oh, yeah, okay, yeah!” Lydia agrees. “Obvs. I’ll see you later.”

When she gets home, she falls asleep across her bed. Her mom wakes her up a few hours later, suggesting a celebration dinner. Lydia groggily agrees and, after her mom leaves, reaches over to check her phone to let Gigi know she’ll be busy.

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 16:10:23: Hey, Lydia. So I think packing is going to take longer than I thought.

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 16:18:01: Which is probably good also, cause—I tried to say something at breakfast but it seemed like you didn’t want to talk about it? I think I need a few days to clear my head.

FROM: Gigi Darcy: Timestamp 16:20:12: Things are fine but I’ll see you in San Fran. Still so excited. xo Gigi

Lydia feels—weird. She isn’t really sure. She can feel the anxiety pushing on the inside of her head, but. This doesn’t sound totally awful? Maybe? She hovers her thumb over the call button, puts the phone down, picks it up again. The more she turns it over, the less idea she has what the hell Gigi even means. If she calls, she can—what? Say _Did I do something wrong_ and let Gigi fill in the blanks? Say _I’m sorry I almost kissed you, let’s pretend it never happened_ and wait for her to agree?(Or, the somehow-persistent voice in her heart suggests, _I’m sorry I freaked out, can we try that again?_ and wait with her fingers crossed and panic in her chest?)

She doesn’t know which option is right. Which one would help. Which one would get her what she wants. (She isn’t even sure what she wants, exactly.) 

Lydia doesn’t have to decide. Not yet.

Her mom knocks on the door again, saying something about errands before dinner. Lydia gets up, puts the decision on a shelf inside of her, and leaves the phone on her bed.

 

**

The next three weeks Lydia keeps herself busy. It’s not hard with the amount of packing and preparing she has to do. She would’ve thought that moving to this smallish apartment less than a year ago would have helped prune down her closet, but every suitcase she tries to fill looks like an explosion. Without the luxury of forty mansion rooms to fill with piles, her entire room and the hallway outside of it turns into one giant mess. She thinks Gigi would tease her. (Her stomach twinges.)

She’s planning, sort of, to let herself _not_ think about everything until she has to sit down and _make_ herself figure it out. Somehow, and maybe unsurprisingly, that’s not how it works. Every stupid thing she owns makes her think of Gigi, and there are about a hundred times a day when she reaches for her phone on autopilot to text her. Each time she feels a little jolt of anxiety, like the thud a roller coaster makes clicking its way up a hill. Occasionally she looks for something she wants to pack and realizes it’s already in a bag sitting in front of her.

She digs through drawers and runs errands. She looks for cat-friendly apartments on Craigslist, even though she’s planning on living with Lizzie and Darcy for a while so that she has time to find a place when she gets there. It’s nice to click through choices that are straightforward and concrete. The suitcases pile up, and her mom tells her she seems distracted. “What? I’m fine, totes fine, just stressed,” she says, and tosses whatever she’s holding onto the shoe duffel. She replays about a hundred conversations in her head a hundred times. They look different then she remembers, and maybe even different each time. She isn’t sure what to think anymore.

Lydia replays that last night the most, but only when she’s had at least one drink. She goes out a lot of evenings, which is great because she can dance and flirt and chat until she’s a little buzzed. It’s mostly on her own but. Whatever. That’s pretty much the only time she can imagine Gigi’s face inches from her own and not feel slightly frantic. A few nights, especially the first few, she drinks more, which turns once into sobbing into her pillow and twice into these sort of stupefied reveries of what could have happened. (She remembers the flush of Gigi’s cheeks and her hair around her face and the pink smudge of her lipstick and— _fuck_.) (It could’ve been fucking glorious.)

And then. She doesn’t know if it’s the reevaluating and reimagining and noticing things she hadn’t before, or if it’s some kind of responsible analytic decision, or if it’s the burning, clenching way her heart still seems to react to the idea of being within an inch of Gigi or holding her hand, touching her skin—but. She thinks she can breathe again. She thinks she’s decided what she wants, what she can let herself hope for, what she needs to say. The roller coaster clicks up the last chain.

When Lydia wedges her bags, full to bursting, into the back of the car and pulls out of the apartment parking lot, home in her mirrors, she thinks she’s supposed to feel like a window’s been thrown open. And she does, a little. But she also feels like she’s holding her breath.

 

** 

Within about six hours of arriving at Lizzie and Darcy’s, Lydia’s stuff is all over the floor of the second-largest guest room. The biggest one is Gigi’s. Darcy told her she could take it anyway (“She’s moving out fully this semester, I believe she will be coming to get the rest of her things soon, and there are very few of them here in any event”), but Lydia feels weird about sleeping in Gigi’s bed without her knowing, and anyway she isn’t a room thief. Also, the second-largest room is only about three square feet smaller than the largest one, so really who cares. She heads back into the living room to grab her last bag and conversationally asks Darcy if she can paint the walls bright pink.

“Oh, Lydia, that’s not—” Lizzie starts, but then cuts herself off and looks at Darcy, who looks back at her, mostly expressionless. One corner of his mouth turns up.

“I don’t see why not,” he says. “If you’re all right with it, Lizzie. She is our guest for as long as she wishes to be here.” He looks at Lydia again, and she blinks for a second at how much of Gigi she sees in his face.

“O-oh, I mean, yes, obviously,” Lizzie says, looking from Darcy to Lydia. “Yeah, of course. I’ll help you paint.”

Lydia hadn’t been entirely serious, but she is absolutely not going to pass up this opportunity. They go buy pink paint that afternoon. Lizzie drives her.

“Of course you can paint the room, Lydia,” she says in the car. “Sorry about that. I want you to feel at home here, you know that, and you can stay until whenever. It’s just weird sometimes, when Mom and Dad have just downsized and here I am with my name on the deed for this huge nice place. I guess I forget I _can_ paint things if I want to.”

Lydia rolls her eyes and says, “All right there, overshare,” but she doesn’t want to lose this moment, this real important thing, so she gives back a response. “Yeah. That must be, I dunno, weird. To get used to. But he’s not a dick about it. Like, if you’re on the deed too that’s something, right?”

“Yeah. Things are good,” Lizzie says, and smiles.

“I knew I liked him,” Lydia says, and Lizzie gives her a look. “Okay, not always. I mean, he did basically suck. But come on! I got you together, in the end, give me credit.” Lizzie gives her another look, this one alarmed, and she amends quickly, “I don’t mean the whole _everything_ , just like, I _told you_ that he _—_ ”

“Okay, yes,” Lizzie agrees, sounding amused and relieved. “You did. You and Gigi both, she was… really _…_ pushing hard. It’s funny how long ago that all is now. I’m so glad you two have gotten close.”

Lydia can feel her face go all hot, and she’s glad Lizzie’s eyes are back on the road. She says, “Yeah,” and looks out the window. The highway rolls by. Part of her wants to say something to Lizzie, to blurt out all the things she’s been thinking, to see if they fit together out loud like they do in her head. But. No. That’s about her and Gigi. Those words belong to them.

 

**

When Lydia drags herself out into the kitchen at 5:30 am, Darcy is already there. He’s fully dressed, thin tie neat against his pressed button-down, and he’s buttering a piece of toast. He looks up when she walks in and pauses.

“Lydia, good morning. You’re up early.”

“Unfortunately,” she says grumpily, helping herself to piece of toast still in the toaster. “Not by choice, but. I’m awake. So whatever.”

“Is there… something you need to be awake for?” Darcy asks, his brow furrowed like he’s trying to remember whether this is something he should know.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Lydia says, sliding the butter over to her side of the counter. “Where are the knives?”

“Ah, in the drawer next to—”

“Thanks,” Lydia says, taking the knife out of his hand. She butters her toast and puts it back in his still-open palm, then pats his hand. He looks a little amused and a little annoyed and like he has no idea how he’s supposed to be reacting.

Maybe she’s being uncharitable, she thinks as she takes a bite, but it’s funny.

She chews in silence for a minute. Darcy coughs and flips open the cover on his iPad. “News,” he says by way of explanation, angling the screen up at her.

“Too early for news. Do they even deliver the real papers yet?”

“Yes, I believe it’s usually around this time that they do, but I find it much more efficient in terms of both space and effort to read online.”

“Makes sense,” Lydia says, and keeps eating.

“I take it you are not a morning person,” Darcy tries.

Lydia rolls her eyes and shrugs. “Like I said. Couldn’t sleep.” And then she gives a little—because he’s letting her paint the room, and because she’s living under a roof with him for the next few months, and because he really _is_ a good guy under all the dorkoweird and maybe because there are maybe some thank yous she never voiced to his face. “It’s been all pretty restless nights recently. Things aren’t great. I dunno.” She thinks the fatigue probably shows on her face, so she lifts a smile and adds, “I mean, it’s amazing being here. And I’m excited for classes.” But. “But. Yeah. I dunno. Things have been kind of weird and I mean, I guess it’s just. I’m really tired.”

Darcy nods and looks down, then looks up and nods a little again. “Have you. That is, I was wondering if you and… have… been in touch at all lately.”

Lydia is so surprised she laughs, because, _Christ_ , what is it with Darcys and bringing up George fucking Wickham at the moments when she expects it least of all. “What, are you crazy? Absolutely not.”

“If you are—not doing well—perhaps,” he starts, and pauses. Lydia has no idea where he’s going with this. “I wonder if contact would be—”

“This isn’t about that,” Lydia says uncomfortably. “This is something else.” Darcy’s face is basically inexpressive, but she thinks she saw something flicker through (Surprise? Upset?), so she makes herself add, “I don’t—it’s fine. Or it will be. But the George stuff? That’s okay now. Like for realsi—for real.” She thinks he relaxes a little when she says this; he lifts his chin away from his neck, anyway, something she’s heard Lizzie’s tease him about doing when he’s uncomfortable.

She should also probably carpe some fucking diem, Lydia thinks. They’re almost almost-family and she’s in love with his sister, so she guesses it’s time. “Um, I should—I should say thank you, though. I mean I did on Lizzie’s videos but. To you. For everything with—that whole situation. The George stuff. That was really good of you.” It's weird saying this, especially unprompted, especially to Darcy, but. Something in his face has softened. She can’t tell if it’s empathy or pity or a weird kind of understanding. She thinks of Gigi, who has never pitied her but still needed her to say that she was okay. So maybe these words are important. Maybe all words are important sometimes.

“I guess I want you to know I’m doing okay about all of everything. I mean, like, it’s something I go days without thinking about at all now.” She shrugs. She knows it does not look as casual as it’s supposed to. “And when I do it’s, I don’t know, not as hard. He’s gone. Time happened. I’m good. Or I will be. But I think. I think I am.”

Darcy reaches out and touches her shoulder. It is a little hesitating, but surprisingly strong. “You are welcome, Lydia. And I am very glad you’re doing well.”

Impulsively, she hugs him. He pats her shoulder a few times, then, only a little uncomfortably, hugs her too.

“It’s unsurprising,” he says as he steps back. “That you are doing well. You and Gigi have always both been so energetic. I apologize, by the way. For not realizing the ways in which that was a credit to you.”

Lydia gives a smile and a little half-salute. “Your own dumb oversight, and I don’t know how either. The adorbs is obvs the best.” Then she yawns and says, “So I think I might go back to bed.”

“That might be wise,” Darcy says. “I believe you have a day of painting ahead of you.”

“I have a few hours,” Lydia says. “It’s still asscrack early.” She heads for the door.

“Ah—Lydia?”

She pivots back around. “Yeah?”

“Whatever it was you were upset about that is not George. I wish you best of luck. And I am rather confident it will work out fine.”

“Huh. Yeah? Thanks,” Lydia says.

When she gets back in bed, eyes heavy, it occurs to her that maybe Darcy hadn’t ever been asking about George at all.

 

**

The handle of the paint roller is way too long to be stable, but there’s no way Lydia can reach the top corners of the room otherwise. So, she’s rolling the pink on in wobbly overlapping streaks that drip down the wall. She can even it out later, or probably Lizzie will. For now she’s just trying to cover as much wall as possible. It looks pretty good; she pushes her hair out of her eyes to see better and streaks pink across her cheek.

“Hey,” Gigi says from the door.

Lydia whips around. “Hey,” she says, her heart in her mouth.

“I came by to get the rest of the stuff from my room,” Gigi says, hovering in the doorway, “But I wanted to say hi. I missed, um. I missed you.”

“That was longer than a few days,” Lydia says reflexively, acerbically, and immediately hates herself for it. “Sorry. Um. That’s not what I—I mean. I mean it’s fine, like really. It was just weird not talking to you. You know? It gave me time to, um, to clear my head too, and I think I. I missed you too. Like a lot.” She offers a smile that she hopes looks quiet and sincere. “Like a lot.”

Gigi fidgets with the books she’s holding, still in the doorframe. “I wanted to say I’m sorry for—if I—I didn’t mean to make things, um, I don’t know, I don’t… You’re my best friend, Lydia, so I’m sorry if I made things weird somehow.”

“You didn’t,” Lydia says immediately. “That’s not—I’m sorry I let you think that, I.” She can feel her heartbeat hammering against her ribcage. Fuck. Fuck. She should have called or texted or—

“No, I asked you for time, and thanks so much for that, I really appreciate it. I think it helped. So I—we can just jump into this semester, right? It’ll be as great as we hoped. I was going to say there’s a—there’s a party a few days from now in my building, I think it’s mostly students and it’s the last weekend night before classes, we can go and you can… can scope out boys and. It will be fun?”

She’s going to have to clear some things up, and soon, Lydia thinks desperately, because she thinks under Gigi’s bravado—Lydia has spent so many hours brooding on and rehashing everything and the tension in this room can’t be _just_ the weirdness. She’s sure. “I don’t want—”

“It will be fun,” Gigi says, decisively. She seems to be gaining momentum. “Hey, do you want help painting?” She puts the books down and looks around for another roller.

“Yeah, sure,” Lydia says. That gives her more time to figure out what to do, what to say. She shrugs. “Your brother said there are more rollers in the storage room, but I dunno where that is.”

“Me neither, actually,” Gigi says, wrinkling her nose. “Seeing as we don’t have one. It must be the building’s. Is he home? I’ll go ask.”

“I think he’s in the study?”

“Okay, cool, hang on,” Gigi says, and runs out of the room again.

Lydia picks up a roller again and swipes at the wall a few times. She thinks maybe she should have kissed Gigi without preamble, derailed the _just-friends_ show before it started. Because something feels inevitable; the fire that’s been glowing in her chest for months is high and catching. She doesn’t want it to go back to stutters and sparks. She’s not sure it can.

When Gigi comes back, she’s not holding a roller brush, but the seriousness is gone from her face. It’s been replaced by something that looks like carefully controlled excitement.

“Not helping after all? Wow, okay,” Lydia says, in a way she hopes sounds casual and teasing. She holds up her paint roller when Gigi looks confused.

“Oh! I’m so sorry, Lyd, I got distracted, William and I were talking.”

“Last-minute graphic-design worries before they lose you for a semester? Domino glitching?”

“No, not exactly,” Gigi says. “I guess you could say brother stuff.” Her eyes are nervous and happy and Lydia gets caught in them for a moment, wondering how she has never noticed them like this before and feeling like she could stay there forever. But she shakes herself free from the thought, which after all is sort of corny, and sort of manages to break a little from Gigi’s gaze.

“So unwanted advice? Life guidance? If that’s anything like sister stuff.” Lydia spins the roller and little flecks of paint splatter onto her face. Gigi giggles, and she feels her cheeks go a little warm under the pink dots. This is—better.

“Sure, something like that. Listen, I do have to move my stuff actually.” Lydia allows herself a pout, and Gigi adds, “After I offered to help, I know. But hey, um, the party I mentioned. You should actually come, okay? I think it really would be—fun. You should come.”

“Obvs,” Lydia says, a warm tendril blossoming out from her heart and settling somewhere in her throat. “I am so there.”

“Great,” Gigi says, “I’ll text you.”

 

**

The party is in an apartment two floors above Gigi’s in a vaguely historic-looking building downtown. Judging by the lobby, the place is a lot of polished chrome and everything is probably super spacious. Lydia tries to imagine Gigi’s apartment as she stands in the elevator on the way up. She suspects there’s already been a tornado of stuff scattered everywhere, casualties of Gigi’s haphazard unpacking, and she smiles a little at the thought.

Lydia fidgets a little waiting for Gigi to answer her knock. It’s like someone has replaced all her blood with adrenaline; the hallway’s humming air conditioner is ocean-waves loud. She looks at the door handle and waits for it to turn; by the time it does she is in a nervous daydream, and she jumps when it clicks.

Gigi bounces out into the hallway in this effortlessly fancy-casual purple dress. It looks soft and pretty and Gigi looks completely stunning, and Lydia has to swallow before she can say, “Hey! Took you a while.”

“Couldn’t find my bag,” Gigi says, holding it up, “Or anything, actually, it’s still kind of a disaster zone in there.” She hovers forward, and Lydia’s senses spike for a sixteenth of a second, but it ends up being a sort of half-hug that gives Lydia a second to breathe normally before Gigi grabs her hand. She thinks she sees the faint tint of a blush before Gigi’s pulling her down the hallway back to the elevator. “So come on, let’s go!”

Lydia can hear the party as soon as she steps out of the elevator. There are voices muffled by a loud layer of what sounds like indie dance rock. She feels her excitement bubbling and shimmies her shoulders a little to work some of it off. Even if she were to put everything she’s hoping for aside, she’d still be thrilled to be here; she loves the noise and the dancing and the flirting and the lightness of being tipsy and feeling free.

A few people are sitting in the hallway talking. They’re outside the door where the noise is loudest, and they nod at Gigi, who introduces Lydia. One of the guys is one of the hosts. His name is Jon and he’s a senior at SF State and is “so pumped to meet you, we lived here last year too, it’s the damn best, can’t wait, can’t wait.” He’s either a little drunk or very genuine; either way, he seems like a cool guy. “See you around,” he says, and Lydia thinks Gigi glances at her before taking her by the hand to pull her inside.

It’s crowded in the apartment, but not wall-to-wall people. They have no trouble winding their way through to the table with the drinks. Lydia knocks back a shot and then picks the least horrible beer. She sips it while chatting with the girls standing near the table, who Gigi also seems to have met already. The conversation’s funny and fast, but Lydia is distracted. Her arm is half an inch from Gigi’s and her skin is prickling. She thinks she is probably looking too much at Gigi and not enough at the other girls, but Gigi keeps taking sips from her drink that leave lipstick marks on the cup and the heat under Lydia’s skin is getting slightly unbearable.

When there’s a lull in the conversation, _finally_ , Lydia grabs Gigi’s arm and says, “Come on, let’s dance.”

There’s music playing, and it’s upbeat and loud and the beat of it is Lydia’s heart. She moves to it, the skirt of her dress swishing across her legs, but she isn’t sure what song is playing. She’s watching Gigi, who is wearing this wearing this radiant unselfconscious half-smile that makes Lydia’s stomach turns over in a wide loop. She’s flushed and radiant and stupidly stupidly beautiful, and she looks up and locks eyes with Lydia.

The song ends, and they’re standing so close. She can hear both of them breathing in the seconds between the music.

She brings her hand up to Gigi’s face almost on impulse, and hears her breath catch, and then Lydia closes those last impossible inches and she is kissing Gigi. Their noses bump a little and the music comes back on and Lydia barely registers either; she is made of adrenaline and fire and heartbeat and the feeling of Gigi’s mouth on her own. There is nothing hesitant about this; it seems both ridiculous and fitting after how long they have circled around it in careful loops. Gigi's hand is at the base of Lydia's neck and her fingers are in her hair and Lydia thinks that if she had the breath to gasp she would, because, _God_.

She wants to never pull away, but after a few long moments she does, suddenly aware of the music still pounding in the background and the looks they're getting. Who cares, she thinks, who cares at all, and she wants to lean in again immediately, but she’s a little light-headed, like the rush of standing after having too many drinks sitting down. She touches her mouth, which is still tingling, and Gigi laughs. The sound is shell-shocked and happy.

“Lyd,” Gigi says, "Lydia," and she touches Lydia's face again and looks just _exultant,_ jubilant and sure, and then she pulls Lydia towards her and kisses her again. It's softer and slower and also shorter; she draws back and smiles and Lydia feels like she is glowing.

One of them pulls the other by the hand to the door, one of them trips laughing into the hallway. Jon tips his cup at them and says _See ya_ on their way out. Lydia thinks she throws a thumbs-up in his direction, but can’t be sure and doesn't care.

Gigi’s apartment is two floors down. They kiss and kiss and kiss in the stairwell.

 

**

"How long for?" Lydia asks. They're lying on her bed at Lizzie’s. There's a TV show on (muted), and of course she's curled up against Gigi's side with her head on her shoulder. It's all so familiar- _plus,_ like a scene out of any month this spring. But now she can lean a little more and kiss Gigi if she wants to. And obviously she wants to. So she does, and it is sweet and she breaks away smiling.

"How long what?"

"Did you want this for?"

"Oh come on, like it wasn't obvious," Gigi says, and when Lydia shakes her head, she looks surprised.

"Gigi, it took me like _forever_ to get it _._ Like until you left."

"For Italy?"

"...For San Fran?" Lydia says, and Gigi looks surprised, then covers her face with a hand and groans like something has clicked. 

"Fitz said you liked someone else," Lydia adds. "I thought you still, like I mean that's why I couldn't, that night on the balcony, I was so sure—"

"Lydia, I _almost kissed you,_ " Gigi says, "And I know, Fitz told me about your conversation while I was in Italy, but I felt like I was being so _obvious_ that I was sure you knew. That's why I thought you pulling away meant you didn't want—"

"Okay excuse me, I was definitely the one that did the almost-kissing," Lydia breaks in indignantly. "And _fucking_ goddammit Fitz, what the fuck, that was a secret."

"I did threaten to beat him up," Gigi says, and Lydia giggles.

"Okay," she says, "Then why the change? Like the second one? Cause I was all set to go for it when I got here and you were all, oh hi Lydia I'm so glad we're pals—"

" _Pals_?"

"What _ev_ er, but like, then you went to get paint and came back and it was like you knew."

Gigi's silent for a moment, like she's deciding whether or not to say something, and then she says, "Don't be too mad at William," and Lydia cackles because _oh my god._

"He said he guessed," Gigi says a little defensively, "because you seemed sad."

Of course he did, Lydia thinks, but what she says, laughing, is, "Why can nobody I know keep any secrets at all?"

Gigi says thoughtfully, "It's not like it's helped, historically, the hiding and avoiding stuff. I mean, look how long it took William and Lizzie. Or," she adds, suddenly a little shy, "or us," and Lydia sees an in.

"So," she says, sitting up and looking pointedly at Gigi, who seems to know immediately where she's going with this and hides her face. "Who was it." 

"Who?"

"You _know_ ," Lydia insists. She doesn't know why she hasn't wondered about this before as more than a passing question, but suddenly she is burning with curiosity, and Lydia Bennet gets what she wants. "Who Fitz thought you still liked."

"It—it doesn't matter," says Gigi helplessly. "Um."

"Come on," Lydia says wickedly, "Don't _avoid—_ "

"It was Lizzie, okay?" Gigi says, her face bright red, and Lydia is so surprised that she falls over. "Like, it wasn't—it wasn't _bad,_ it was barely anything, but you see why I couldn't—why I had to—oh, forget it."

" _Seriously_ , Gigi? Oh my god. Oh my _god,_ " Lydia says. She should feel weirder about this, she knows, but it's just so funny, all of their stupid ridiculous missteps that have led them here. She does have a hot rock of jealousy sinking into her stomach, though, and she thinks it infects her laughter a little, because Gigi looks sort of uncomfortable and apologetic. "Lizzie, _really_?"

"Can't say much for taste?" Gigi offers, and Lydia snorts at the familiar words.

"No, I guess not. But trust me," Lydia says as she grabs Gigi's hand, brings it to her own cheek, looks seriously at her. "You're getting better." Gigi laughs and Lydia smiles. Their gazes linger on each other's for a second, and Lydia thinks _this is mine_.

Gigi drops her hand to Lydia's shoulder and says in a voice of feigned nonchalance, "I guess to answer your question—how long for—um, Fitz's information was outdated almost as soon as I got here." She pauses, and her eyes go sort of intense. "Because I was over any, any _vestige_ of anything else as soon as I really met you."

The rock of jealousy is gone in a heartbeat, replaced by a burning something else, and Lydia decides she believes Gigi. She doesn't even care if it might be partially romantic bullshit; it's the important kind of honest and that makes it true enough, in this moment and tomorrow and the day after that. She pushes forward and kisses Gigi into the pillows.

 

** 

FROM: Lizzie Bennet: Timestamp 17:45:27: I'll be home in 20. There's a Thai place I thought we could go to for dinner if you want? I want to hear about your first day of classes!

TO: Lizzie Bennet: Sounds good

When Lizzie pulls up in front of the apartment building, Lydia is outside waiting. She opens the door, swings inside, and pulls it shut in one movement, and before Lizzie can say anything, Lydia says, "Gigi and I are dating."

She's prepared to let Lizzie blink for a second, and she does, but then she sort of shrugs and says "Good day, then?" and Lydia is floored.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"I—yeah, I did. Congratulations. Is this new?" 

"A few days, yeah," Lydia says. This is not at all the reaction she was expecting. "Lizzie, if you're drunk you should probs let me drive."

"I'm not _drunk_ ," Lizzie says indignantly, but she puts the car in park. "I'm just not _surprised_. Was I supposed to be?"

"Um, yeeesssss," Lydia draws the word out, "Because there's no way anyone could've told you yet, so unless you're pretending to be psychic now?"

"Lydia, you're my sister," Lizzie says, managing to sound both frustrated and tender. "You've been talking about her nonstop for months. I've seen you two together. I didn't _know,_ and I will admit that I was pretty sure you were straight, but I'm not _surprised_. It sort of, you know, makes sense. Like it would work."

"Oh," Lydia says. "Okay."

"And I am very happy for you," Lizzie adds, touching Lydia's hand.

"I... Thank you," Lydia says. She smiles and leans across the seat gap to put her head on Lizzie's shoulder.

"Did you tell Mom yet?" Lizzie asks. "Or Jane?"

"I called Jane earlier," Lydia says. "She was confused, I think, but like, happy obviously. And I called Mary too, she was thrilled." Lizzie raises an eyebrow and Lydia amends, "Like, Mary-thrilled. It was sweet. And I'll tell Mom eventually. She'll be fine, but, you know. She’s Mom. I'd rather be non-single for more than three days before I start hearing the word 'grandchildren.'"

"I think— _don't_ tell Jane—I think Bing might be proposing soon, so if you time it right then you won't have to have more than a couple days of it," Lizzie says, and Lydia squeals.

"He _is not_ , tell me _everything."_

_"_ Tell me about classes!"

"At dinner," Lydia promises. "Girl talk first."

"Okay," Lizzie relents, "Girl talk first."

 

**

Lydia can’t believe she’s spending a Saturday night at the world’s most amazing tiki bar, in San Francisco, with _Gigi Darcy_ , who she is _dating_ , but here she is. The whole place is set up like a pirate ship with a veil of blue fog and the ambience and drama of it all makes it seem like she’s supposed to wake up any minute. This is way, way too great to be allowed. She’s holding the best rum cocktail she’s ever had, and she’s standing close at Gigi’s side in the dim blue mist, and there are _glowing puffer fish lights_. And she’s pretty sure she’ll get to kiss Gigi in a taxi later, which is definitely a turn-on, so. Yeah. It’s a good night.

“I knew you’d love it,” Gigi says happily in her ear. It’s crowded, and they’re scoping out some seats, but for now they’re standing near the back bar under a sign decorated mostly with rope and anchors.

“There’s _colored water_ _everywhere_ and like ten kinds of rum, Gig, this is totes perfect.”

“It’s incredible,” she agrees, and then adds, “But _you’re_ incredible,” and Lydia can feel a smile tugging at her mouth. She rolls her eyes.

“Obvs! I know,” she says, and Gigi squeezes her arm.

“Hey,” Gigi says, leaning in, “Love you.”

“You too,” Lydia responds automatically, and takes a sip of her drink and then the words click and she keeps herself from doing the most worst-timed of spit-takes. “I mean I—Gigi um—Yeah, I love you too.”

Gigi beams, and she is so beautiful and looks so happy that Lydia thinks her heart might burst.

And then, because this night is perfect and Lydia is on top of the world, seats open up by the bar. Lydia grabs Gigi’s hand and pulls her towards them, and it’s a narrow miss with some tourists who’ve just walked in and think they’re entitled. Gigi wins the seats and Lydia picks new drinks for both of them. They laugh about the tourists, and talk about places they want to go, and then Gigi starts talking about her first real design project and how cool it’s gonna be and Lydia sits back and sips her rum and listens.

It gets late, so they finish their last drinks and decide it’s time to hail a taxi. The world feels right on Lydia’s shoulders as they step out into the night. The feeling doesn’t come from the rum, and while it could be from the night air, it’s probably from the fact that Gigi’s arm is settled comfortably around her waist. Whatever combination of good things it is, it’s an awesome feeling.

And as for the taxi, Lydia’s right about the kissing.

 

** 

The sun is out, and it's a wonderful warm day in October. Lydia is lying outside the drama department on the grass, soaking up as much light as she can. She's sitting with Jon and his girlfriend, who happens to be in a bunch of her psych classes. Theoretically they're all studying, but mostly they’re chatting on and off over their textbooks. Lydia chimes in occasionally, between reading her script and holding it as a visor, just letting the sunshine wash over her.

She keeps winding up lost in daydreams, nonspecific beautiful ones where the sun will last past her midterm next week on through to another weekend. She wants to learn this city; she and Gigi have been wandering. They’ve been to Gigi's favorite places, new streets Lydia drags them down, every bar on Yelp. When they've seen all of it, they'll see it again.

She rolls over, dropping the script onto the grass beside her, and goes to pull out her textbook. Studying is still gross but her classes are pretty cool, and she wants to graduate in two years with her BA and her teaching certificate at the same time as Gigi, so. Midterms. Plus, studying with friends, she has realized, makes it way better. 

"Hey, Lydia," Jon says as she heaves the book out of her bag. "Someone here for you."

She looks up and sees Gigi walking across the quad, and she gets up and runs to kiss her.

"Hey, you," Gigi says, smiling at her.

"I wasn't expecting to see you here," Lydia says. "It's a nice surprise."

"I didn't have class this afternoon, so I had a little free time. And I wanted to see my girlfriend," Gigi replies easily. Lydia thinks she will never stop feeling a little thrill of joy at hearing Gigi call her that.

"Hell yeah you did," she says. "Want to come sit?"

They settle back onto the grass. Lydia plays with Gigi's hair and they talk about Lydia's rehearsals, Gigi's projects, classes, bridesmaid dresses. The sun curves a burnished arc against the sky; Jon and his girlfriend have to run to class. Gigi doesn't seem interested in getting up. Lydia suggests, idly, that they stay until the sun goes down. "We might be able to drag a couch out of one of the buildings," she adds, and Gigi laughs.

When orange and gold are tingeing the sky and it looks like it's starting to flush to deep purple, Gigi stands and stretches. "Come on," she says. "Let's go back to yours for dinner. I think William is trying to cook."

“Better him than me,” Lydia says.

Gigi giggles and replies, “But you order great takeout!”

The evening is bringing cool fall air. Lydia grabs for her sweater, pink against the grass, and smiles.

Today it is beautiful, and tomorrow will be, and then if it rains, it rains. She stands up to join Gigi, who takes her hand, and Lydia thinks, world, show me what you've got.

**Author's Note:**

> So here I am, two and a half years late.
> 
> In my defense, I only watched the Lizzie Bennet Diaries for the first time this March (which is something I wish I could go back to 2012 and fix). I honestly can't remember why I finally got a move on, but anyway, it was great, and then my friend thunderburning linked me to allthingsholy's [get loved, make more](http://archiveofourown.org/works/690426#main), which I think I read four times in 24 hours, followed in no short order by the rest of the fic tag.
> 
> I've been reading fic for years, but I had never had quite this compulsion to write it before. I owe that to get loved, make more, and Care's [Searching For a Sound We Hadn't Heard Before](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2892998), both of which I have read actually countless times at this point. They got under my skin and stayed there.
> 
> That was the source of the impulse, and the catalyst was Walk The Moon's "Shut Up And Dance". For a long time, getting to that song’s moment was the driving force behind this fic. Overall, its song is very much Stars' "Hold On When You Get Love And Let Go When You Give It," from which the title is taken, but my April fever over Shut Up And Dance still did wind up culminating in the party scene. 
> 
> So I owe this fic to those two stories, and those two songs, and also acommonrose who did a read for me, but also especially to thunderburning, my most wonderful beta and friend, who pointed me in this direction in the first place and read and advised me on every scrap of writing I threw her way. You are the absolute best!
> 
> This has been so much fun to write. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go reread _get loved, make more_ and _Searching For a Sound_ again.


End file.
